Congress candidate Ravindra Dhangekar celebrates his victory in the Kasba Peth Assembly bypoll with supporters, in Pune on Thursday. Pavan Khengre In a major setback to the ruling Shiv Sena-BJP alliance in Maharashtra led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, the BJP lost the intensely fought “battle of prestige” in the Kasba Assembly constituency, its bastion for nearly three decades, to the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA). But the BJP retained the Chinchwad Assembly seat. The results of the bypolls to the two seats were declared on Thursday.
In the prestigious Kasba Assembly seat, which is in the heart of Pune city, Congress’s Ravindra Dhangekar defeated BJP’s Hemant Rasane by 10,950 votes. Dhangekar bagged 73,194 votes while Rasane got 62,244 votes. In Chinchwad,
BJP’s Ashwini Jagtap defeated NCP’s Nana Kate by a margin of 36,000 votes. Ashwini polled 1,35,603 votes while Kate polled 99,435 votes.
The victory of the Congress, which wrested the Kasba Peth seat from the BJP after 28 years, assumes significance as the party has for the first time won a seat in Pune city after drawing a blank in two successive Assembly elections. The last time the Congress had won the seat was in 1995. After that, the seat was held by the BJP until 2019, first by Girish Bapat and then by Mukta Tilak. The seat fell vacant after Mukta’s death in December last year.
The Chinchwad seat had fallen vacant following the death of sitting BJP MLA Laxman Jagtap in January. Jagtap had won the seat since 2009 for three consecutive terms. In 2009, he won the seat for the first time as an NCP rebel and subsequently on a BJP ticket.
Since 2014, the Congress, which had ruled the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) for years before that and had MPs elected from Pune several times, had been drawing a blank in the Assembly polls. In 2014, swept away in the Modi wave, it had lost all eight seats in Pune city. It met a similar fate in the 2019 elections as well. “This victory is a major morale booster for our rank and file. The victory will rejuvenate the party which has been losing in Assembly as well as Parliamentary elections in Pune since 2014. For the civic elections which will be held any time, this victory has brought in a breath of fresh air. We hope to ride on our success in the Assembly elections too,” said Ramesh Iyer, general secretary of Pune Congress.
Dhangekar on his part credited his spectacular success to his voters. “It is the victory of voters as they got me elected. I will work hard for the people of the constituency…” He said state Congress chief Nana Patole, NCP’s Ajit Pawar and Aadtiya Thackeray of Shiv Sena (UBT) called to congratulate him. “I thank the NCP, Shiv Sena (UBT) along with everyone from the Congress. I am thankful to NCP chief Sharad Pawar as he at this age addressed three rallies for me,” Dhangekar said.
Rasane, on the other hand, said, “The BJP put its trust in me but I must have fallen short in something that I had to face defeat. I will analyse the results and work on overcoming the shortcomings.”
The Kasba bypoll was made a battle of prestige by the ruling BJP-Shiv Sena government with Shinde and Fadnavis along with state ministers, leaders of the BJP and Shiv Sena led by Shinde intensely campaigning for Rasane. The BJP had raised the issue of ‘Hindutva’ in the last leg of campaigning and urged voters to vote for BJP’s candidate. Also, the MNS led by Raj Thackeray had extended support to the BJP in the by-election.
For Congress’ candidate, alliance partners NCP and Shiv Sena (UBT) gave full support in the Kasba bypoll with NCP chief Sharad Pawar, senior leaders Ajit Pawar, Jayant Patil and Aaditya Thackeray along with party leader Sushma Andhare campaigning for him.
Ajit Pawar took a jibe at the CM. “Just imagine, the chief minister was holding a roadshow in Pune for its candidate. Both the CM and deputy CM besides their leaders and ministers went all out to win the seat. But ultimately we scored,” he said.
Pawar said even MNS workers and leaders backed Dhangekar.
The BJP, however, downplayed the defeat in Kasba.
Deputy Chief Minister and BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis said the BJP has polled 45 per cent votes in Kasba Peth, which is higher compared to the last two elections in 2014 and 2019. “Yet, the BJP lost the bypoll. Congress candidate Ravindra Dhangekar’s victory is his own credit and not the party’s, as he did not use a single picture of (Congress leader) Rahul Gandhi during campaigning.”
In case of a party like BJP, which is known to win all elections, even a single defeat is blown out, he added.
On the Chinchwad bypoll, he said, “Our rivals are spreading lies that the presence of Independent candidate Rahul Kalate helped us win Chinchwad.”
“We have lost and we accept the defeat. We will analyse, introspect and take stock of our performance. An internal report will be submitted to the party leadership citing reasons for our defeat. However, we don’t believe that this defeat will have any impact on the civic elections. We won in Chinchwad and it should have a positive impact on our chances in the civic elections in the PCMC… every election has its own agenda. The Kasba loss was a standalone defeat and it will not have any impact on any future elections,” said BJP spokesperson Sandeep Khardekar.
Arvind Shinde, president of Pune city Congress, said, “Voters of Pune have given a befitting reply to the BJP and District Guardian Minister Chandrakant Patil… Patil had asked who is Ravindra Dhangekar? The voters have given Patil a reply… He is a Punekar.”