Mumbai North Central: Varsha Gaikwad romps home with popular support

Congress' Varsha Gaikwad defeated BJP's Ujjwal Nikam by 16,514 votes in a close fight for Mumbai North Central

The Congress’ Mumbai chief, Varsha Gaikwad defeated former special public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam, representing the BJP, by a margin of 16,514 votes. Both parties had announced their candidates just a day before the deadline for filing nominations, thereby giving the two candidates very little time to campaign. Gaikwad bagged 4,45,545 votes, while Nikam secured 4,29,031 votes. It was a very close fight, with Nikam dominating the major part of the day with three-digit margins. It was only after 3 pm that Gaikwad started leading and eventually won the seat.

Congress Leader Varsha Gaikwad. (Photo by Bhushan Koyande/HT Photo)

Gaikwad got support from the Dalit, Muslim and Marathi communities in a big way.

This was despite the Maha Vikas Aghadi not allotting her a ticket for the Mumbai South Central constituency, which is the Dharavi MLA’s home turf. Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray unilaterally announced that Anil Desai would contest from Mumbai South Central. Gaikwad was very unhappy and protested the decision, following which Anil Parab of Shiv Sena (UBT) suggested that she could contest from Mumbai North Central and his party would use its entire machinery to back her.

This, however, upset Congress leader Naseem Khan, who said the party had not fielded a single Muslim candidate in Maharashtra. He even resigned as the party’s star campaigner, before being cajoled by Rahul Gandhi.

Mumbai North Central has traditionally been a Congress seat, although the Communist Party of India, Janata Party, Shiv Sena and, more recently, BJP have also tasted success. Sunil Dutt’s daughter Priya Dutt represented the constituency from 2005 to 2009, after which the seat went to Gurudas Kamat in 2009. The BJP’s Poonam Mahajan knocked the Congress off the seat in 2014 and then won again in 2019. However, she was denied a ticket in 2024. Speculation was rife that the BJP leadership wanted the party’s Mumbai chief, Ashish Shelar, to contest but he had flatly refused. Finally, the party handpicked Nikam, who was a reluctant candidate and wanted a Rajya Sabha seat.