Mumbai: Counting of votes for the richest civic body in India, Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) indicated that the leads were in favour of the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance. However, it looks unlikely for the combine to be able to hold a majority.
The trends indicate a hung civic body in Mumbai, which could bring Raj Thackeray's MNS and independent candidates into the limelight. The Sena-BJP alliance looks set to retain power with the help of independent candidates.
Raj Thackeray also plays a crucial role. If Raj decides to go with the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance, the combine will retain the BMC easily. This may prove be a major setback for the Congress-NCP alliance as it may need the support of not just MNS, but also the independents to attain a majority.
Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, who had claimed before the polls that Shiv Sena and its leader Bal Thackeray will be rendered irrelevant once the results were out, seems to have overestimated the Mumbaikar's eagerness to get rid of the 16-year "misrule" of the saffron alliance.
This is first time that the Congress was contesting the BMC polls in an alliance with the NCP. What had prompted Chavan to cobble together an alliance with NCP for the Mumbai civic body poll was the fact that in the last elections, the votes polled by the Congress and NCP, which had then contested the BMC poll separately, if added, would have yielded 132 seats. "Hence, getting a simple majority of 114 seats in the 227-member BMC should not be difficult," Chavan had said.
Chavan had been saying that MNS support base, which has widened markedly since the 2007 BMC poll, would benefit the Congress-led Democratic Front, as the Raj Thackeray-led party would into eat into the Sena-BJP votes as in the past.
Meanwhile, the Shiv Sena-BJP combine is also set to retain Thane as the alliance took the top spot in the Thane Municipal Corporation poll.
Out of the 130 seats, Congress and the NCP alliance bagged 52 and the Shiv Sena and BJP alliance 61 seats.
In Pune, the NCP is likely to emerge as the single largest party, but will also need the support of the Congress.
The BJP maintained its lead over the Congress and the NCP in party President Nitin Gadkari's home city Nagpur.
(With additional information from PTI)####
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