Deglur bypoll sees 63% turnout; result on November 2 | Mumbai news - Hindustan Times
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Deglur bypoll sees 63% turnout; result on November 2

By, Mumbai
Oct 31, 2021 02:38 AM IST

The Deglur bypoll, which is a fight for prestige between the three ruling parties and the opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), saw a turnout of 63.33%. he counting will be held on November 2.

The Deglur bypoll, which is a fight for prestige between the three ruling parties and the opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), saw a turnout of 63.33%. Congress’s Jitesh Antapurkar, who has been fielded as Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) candidate, is facing BJP’s Subhash Sabne and Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi’s Uttam Ingole. The counting will be held on November 2.

The Deglur bypoll, which is a fight for prestige between the three ruling parties and the opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), saw a turnout of 63.33%. he counting will be held on November 2. (Hindustan Times)
The Deglur bypoll, which is a fight for prestige between the three ruling parties and the opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), saw a turnout of 63.33%. he counting will be held on November 2. (Hindustan Times)

The constituency saw good response since morning and had registered 60.95% turnout till 5pm and 48.47% till 3pm. A few voters had complained of disappearance of their names from the rolls in morning. The election machinery had to replace 11 electronic voting machines after they developed glitches. There were 298,353 registered voters, while the election machinery had set up 412 polling booths.

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“The voting will go on till 7pm. We are expecting the turnout to touch 66% to 67%. There are no major complaints of missing names. Amid the Covid-19 protocol, we had increased the number of polling booths by bringing the number of voters per booth down to 1,000 from 1,500. This may have resulted in the shifting of some names to other booths. We have rigorously implemented the drive for the addition of names of voters ahead of the poll. The EVMs which developed glitches during voting were replaced immediately,” said an officer, requesting anonymity.

The election to the Assembly constituency in Nanded in central Maharashtra was necessitated because of the death of the sitting Congress MLA Raosaheb Antapurkar in April this year. The constituency is reserved for Scheduled Caste. Congress has fielded his son Jitesh as the candidate of MVA. The candidate is facing BJP’s Subhash Sabne, who joined the party, defecting from Shiv Sena a day before filing nomination. Prakash Ambedkar-led Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi has fielded Dr Uttam Ingole.

The MVA candidate believably has an upper hand for various reasons. “Though by poaching Shiv Sena leader and 3-term MLA Subhash Sabne ahead of filing of nomination, BJP tried to turn the table on ruling parties. The defection of Bhaskar Khatgaonkar changed the picture. KHatgaonkar, who has served three terms each in Assembly and Lok Sabha, has sizable influence in the constituency. The Maratha leader who is a hardcore Congress leader had defected to BJP in 2014 but never could be established in the party. His differences with sitting BJP MP Pratap Chikhalikar triggered his ‘ghar vapsi’ which will play in our favour,” said a Congress leader.

Nanded is stronghold of Congress and citadel of state minister and former chief minister Ashok Chavan. Most of the local bodies in the district are controlled by the party. The results of the bypoll will have direct bearing on the politics of the leader. Knowing this, the BJP has gone all out to win the election. The BJP leaders have claimed to repeat the history of Pandharpur bypoll in Deglur by snatching the seat from the ruling parties. In May this year, the BJP had defeated NCP candidate which was seen as the major defeat for the state government as the ruling parties had fought it collectively.

The results of the bypoll could be an indication of the mood of the people ahead of major local body elections to be held early next year. BJP’s union minister Raosaheb Danve, Bhagwat Karad, state leaders Devendra Fadnavis, Chandrakant Patil, Ashish Shelar campaigned for the party candidate. Deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar, social justice minister Dhanajay Munde, minority minister Nawab Malik (all NCP), Congress’s senior leader Mallikarjun Kharge, Sushilkumar Shinde, Shiv Sena leader and junion minister Abdul Sattar campaigned for Antapurkar.

Political analyst Hemant Desai said the bypoll will help the ruling or the opposition parties to score over each other depending upon the result. “Amid the ongoing fight between the BJP and MVA over in the wake of the Aryan Khan drug case and ahead of the forthcoming local body elections, the bypoll results are important. The victory will help them to turn the table on the opponents by giving it the colour of public sentiments. More than anything else, it’s a presige fight for Ashok Chavan as it will be viewed as his victory of defeat,” he said.

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  • ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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    Surendra P Gangan is Senior Assistant Editor with political bureau of Hindustan Times’ Mumbai Edition. He covers state politics and Maharashtra government’s administrative stories. Reports on the developments in finances, agriculture, social sectors among others.

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