Maharashtra Poll Dance Over: 9.7 Crore Voters To Give Verdict On Wednesday – News18
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Maharashtra elections 2024: Mahayuti or Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), which party will the state’s voters pick?
The voter count in Mumbai has crossed one crore. (File)
Maharashtra’s 2024 assembly election potboiler is all set for its climax as citizens cast their votes on Wednesday (November 20) for 288 seats, sealing the fate of several political bigwigs. The results will be announced on November 23.
Promises, schemes, emotions, drama and allegations, the past few months saw it all and more as the two alliances – Mahayuti (BJP, Shinde Sena and Ajit Pawar’s NCP) and Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) (Congress, Sena UBT and NCP Sharad Pawar) – clashed.
This is a unique election in many ways. Not only will it empower one alliance to rule the state for the next five years, but it will also decide the political future of heavyweights, namely Sharad Pawar, chief minister Eknath Shinde, Uddhav Thackeray and deputy CM Ajit Pawar. The two Pawars, Shinde and Thackeray are engaged in an intense battle to seek legitimacy for their parties.
The BJP is contesting 149 seats, Shiv Sena 81 seats, and the Ajit Pawar-led NCP has fielded candidates in 59 constituencies. In the opposition alliance, the Congress has fielded 101 candidates, Shiv Sena (UBT) 95, and the NCP (SP) 86. A total of 145 seats are needed to form a government.
This year, 4,136 candidates are contesting, up from 3,239 in 2019. Among the key candidates are Devendra Fadnavis, Eknath Shinde, Ajit Pawar, Aaditya Thackeray, Zeeshan Siddique, Chhagan Bhujbal, Shaina NC, Milind Deora, Nitesh and Nilesh Rane, Amit Thackeray.
BALLOTSPEAK: MUMBAI’S VOTER COUNTER ABOVE 1 CRORE
Maharashtra has 9,70,25,119 voters – 5,00,22,739 male, 4,69,96,279 female, and 6,101 transgenders. The total number of PwD (Persons with Disabilities) voters is 6,41,425, while the number of service voters from the armed forces is 1,16,170.
The voter count in Mumbai has crossed one crore, up from 98.95 lakh during the Lok Sabha polls held earlier this year, a civic official said. There will be 1,00,186 polling booths in Maharashtra this time, compared to 96,654 booths in the 2019 assembly elections.
The Maharashtra Chief Electoral Office (CEO) has listed 990 polling stations in the critical category and the Central Reserve Police Force units (CRPF) have been deployed at these sensitive stations. The administration will implement a webcasting process at 67,557 polling stations. A total of 1.64 lakh ballot units, 1.19 lakh control units and 1.28 lakh VVPAT machines will be used in the elections.
SPLIT AND TELL: REGIONAL PARTIES, NATIONAL IMPACT
The senior Pawar, who will turn 84 next month, delivered a debilitating blow to his nephew, whose breakaway faction was recognised as the real Nationalist Congress Party by the Election Commission, in the Lok Sabha elections and is looking to strike a knockout punch in the assembly polls, while Ajit Pawar is hoping to bounce back.
The Lok Sabha results, however, gave both Thackeray, who heads Shiv Sena (UBT) after the Shinde-led group was recognised as the real Shiv Sena, and the chief minister something to cheer about, rendering the assembly election the air of a final match that could deliver only one winner.
How the four regional satraps perform is bound to dictate the politics of the two national parties – BJP and Congress.
THE FIGHT IS ON
While the two Senas are taking on each other in over 50 seats, the nominees of the two Pawars are up against each other in nearly 37 constituencies. At the centre of poll sweepstakes involving the two Senas is the question mark over Mumbai, the country’s financial capital.
The uncle-nephew battle is the sharpest in western Maharashtra, a prosperous region where the Pawar clan is rooted.
Sharad Pawar, a four-term former chief minister of the state whose wily moves have shaped the state’s politics for decades, has called for the defeat of betrayers, a reference to Ajit Pawar and his nominees.
The nephew, in turn, has refrained from using sharp words against him, wary of stirring popular sympathy for the ageing leader who had handed him a big defeat in the Lok Sabha polls.
The NCP (SP) had won eight seats in the Lok Sabha polls against the NCP’s one. The Shiv Sena (UBT) had emerged victorious in nine constituencies against the Sena’s seven.
The Maratha factor, amid the agitation for reservation led by activist Manoj Jarange, could impact the performances, particularly of the Other Backward Class (OBC) candidates, as the community is against the quota.
SLOGAN TO SCHEMES: THE POLL CAMPAIGN
The election campaign saw prominent leaders like Narendra Modi, Amit Shah, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, and many union ministers crisscrossing the state to garner votes for their candidates.
The Mahayuti is banking on its popular schemes like ‘Majhi Ladki Bahin’ for women helping it retain power. The BJP’s use of slogans like ‘Batenge toh katenge’ and ‘Ek hai toh safe hai’ prompted the opposition parties to accuse the Mahayuti of polarising voters along religious lines. Not all BJP allies supported these slogans. Ajit Pawar, who is part of Mahayuti, distanced himself from them. Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis attempted to clarify the meaning of the slogans, leading to confusion within the ruling alliance.
The MVA alliance countered the ruling combine’s rhetoric by focusing on issues such as caste-based census, social justice, and protecting the Constitution.
With PTI Inputs
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