MUMBAI: Narayan Chaudhary, 58, the rebel corporator of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), was elected mayor of Bhiwandi-Nizampur city, as the Congress-led Bhiwandi Secular Front (BSF) secured power in the Bhiwandi-Nizampur Municipal Corporation (BNMC) in the elections held on Friday. Congress candidate Tariq Momin, 34, was elected deputy mayor.
Chaudhary is one of the six BJP corporators who voted against the party – a first in the recently held local body elections. This action has prompted the BJP to challenge the elections before the Konkan divisional commissioner and take action against the rebels. The party will seek the disqualification of Chaudhary and five other rebels.
“The election results prove that a set of BJP corporators participated in cross-voting. All those who went against the party’s whip will face action,” Maharashtra BJP president Ravindra Chavan told reporters on Friday. He added that while Chaudhary was the party’s first mayoral pick, the decision was revised to curb infighting within the organisation.
Following the win, Chaudhary said, “As I have been elected mayor of Bhiwandi city, I want to assure people that I will work for the city’s development.” He, however, reserved comment about the BJP’s intent to act against him and other rebels.
Congress emerged as the single largest party in the 90-member BNMC by winning 30 seats but fell 16 seats short of a majority to win power.
BJP won 22 seats, NCP (SP) and Shiv Sena won 12 each, Samajwadi Party (SP) won six seats and local fronts such as Vilas Patil-led Konark Vikas Aghadi (KVA) won four seats and Bhiwandi Vikas Aghadi (BVA) won three. One independent also succeeded in winning the election.
In the mayoral election held on Friday, Congress-backed Chaudhary secured 48 votes. KVA bagged 25 votes – its candidate Vilas Patil backed by Shiv Sena – while BJP’s Sneha Patil finished third with 16 votes.
This is the second municipal corporation after Latur where Congress has managed to win power.
In this case, it is in alliance with two other parties. It failed to win the Chandrapur civic body due to infighting. However, in Bhiwandi, Congress with the help of local NCP (SP) MP Suresh Mhatre and SP MLA Rais Shaikh managed to score over both Shiv Sena and BJP. The Mhatre-Shaikh duo played a significant role in the win. Meanwhile, Shaikh is reportedly having differences with the Maharashtra SP leadership.
Soon after the elections, Congress formed the BSF along with NCP (SP) and SP. Together, they notched a tally of 48 seats, which was two more than the majority needed to win power. However, SP’s ambition for the mayoral post created cracks in the bloc. The party exited the BSF on Thursday and allied with Shiv Sena.
Chaudhary, who was elected as a BJP corporator on January 17, was the party’s original mayoral candidate but rebelled with five others after the party nominated Sneha Patil for the post.
Congress and NCP (SP) then backed Chaudhary.
“It is a victory for the secular front. We believe in building and not breaking,” said NCP (SP)’s Bhiwandi MP Suresh Mhatre.
Taking a swipe at BJP, Maharashtra Congress president Harshwardhan Sapkal said: “We did not bring BJP corporators to our side through pressure from central investigation agencies or horse-trading. We were short of 16 seats to secure a majority and therefore chose to pursue alliance politics.”