It was a mixed bag of sorts for the five Central and State BJP-Shiv Sena ministers from Maharashtra.
While three of them — BJP’s Nitin Gadkari (Union Minister), Subhash Bhamre (Union Minister of State for Defence), and Girish Bapat (State Cabinet Minister for Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Protection) — are set to coast to victory, two others — Shiv Sena’s Anant Geete (Minister of Heavy Industries) and BJP’s Hansraj Ahir (Minister of State for Home Affairs) — face major upsets.
Mr. Gadkari was set to beat Nana Patole of the Congress by a comfortable margin of more than two lakh votes, at the time of going to press..
In 2014, Mr. Gadkari, contesting for the first time from Nagpur, had trounced Congress heavyweight and four-time MP Vilas Muttemwar.
The Dhule Lok Sabha constituency turned out to be a one-sided affair with Mr. Bhamre defeated his nearest rival Kunal Patil (Congress). Here, the Congress’ machinations and Sena’s alleged resentment, came a cropper as Mr. Bhamre won by a margin of more than 2.25 lakh votes.
In the Raigad Lok Sabha seat in western Maharashtra, Mr. Geete, a five-time MP (twice from Raigad) lost by 30,000 votes to senior Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Sunil Tatkare in a humdinger of a contest. It was sweet revenge for Mr. Tatkare, who had lost by just 2,000 votes to Mr. Geete in 2014.
In yet another closely fought contest, Mr. Ahir, a three-time MP from Chandrapur, despite gaining in the early rounds, was on course to give Congress its only victory from Chandrapur. He was trailing to Suresh Danorkar by over 47,000 votes.
The lone State cabinet minister in the fray Girish Bapat was comfortably placed to beat his rival, Mohan Joshi (Congress) in Pune by over three lakh votes.
The Congress, after much vacillation, chose Mr. Joshi, an old-timer, to reclaim Pune, a Congress bastion. However, due to his close ties with Mr. Bapat, it was felt that Pune seat would be a walkover for BJP.
In fact, Mr. Bapat’s supporters had put up victory placards on Wednesday in anticipation of victory.