E-Paper
Bypolls to local bodies seats held in Maharashtra
The voting began at 7.30 am in Dhule, Nandurbar, Akola, Washim, Nagpur, and Palghar amid complaints of the names of the voters going missing from electoral lists.
Bypolls for the 84 seats of district councils (DC) and 141 panchayat samitis (PS) in six districts of Maharashtra reported 63% voting on Tuesday. Eyes in the political corridors are set on the results of the bypolls which are being held without reservation to the Other Backward Classes (OBC) for the first time since the quota was introduced in the early 1990s. The counting of votes will begin at 10am on Wednesday.
The bypolls to the district councils and panchayat samitis were held Dhule, Nandurbar, Akola, Washim, Nagpur and Palghar. The polls were necessitated after the Supreme Court stayed OBC quota for want of empirical data and cancelled the elections of the representatives elected from the seats reserved for the community.
After the voting began at 7.30 am, the election authorities received complaints that the names of voters had gone missing. In Nagpur, 16 DC and 31 PS seats went for polls, while in Dhule, votes were cast for 14 DC and 28 PS candidates. Palghar’s 15 DC and 14 PS seats went for polling on Tuesday. Washim and Akola districts have 14 seats each of councils and 27 and 28 seats of PS that went to polls. Nandurbar’s 12 DC seats saw election. One DC seat in Dhule and three PS seats in Dhule and Nandurbar were elected unopposed as only one candidate each stood from these seats.
“The bypolls may prove trendsetters ahead of the massive local body elections scheduled to be held early next year. This has been the first election without reservation to OBCs and as such it could indicate an idea among the community. Most of the districts which went to polls are backward and OBC-dominated. Results many see change in power in some of these districts,” said a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader requesting anonymity of name. BJP had fielded OBC candidates on all the seats that fell vacant after the quota was quashed.
In the elections held in these district councils last January, BJP had won the highest 39 seats out of 56 in Dhule council, while Congress had retained its power in Nagpur DC by winning 30 of 58 seats. In Nandurbar, BJP and Congress won 23 (of total 56) seats each, while Congress’s Seema Walvi was elected as head the body. Palghar DC is ruled by Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party.
The State Election Commission (SEC) had announced the bypolls last month, immediately after SC asked it to submit the status report on the elections in six DCs and the samitis under them in six weeks.
In March, the Apex court stayed the OBC reservation and asked SEC to cancel the elections of the candidates elected from the quota and hold bypolls. SEC had to put the bypolls on hold March after the second wave of Covid-19. The process for electing new candidates has now started from where it was stalled last year.
Though OBC seats have been thrown open for the open category, most of political parties have fielded candidates from the community.
Meanwhile, Congress has ordered an inquiry against its leader from Nagpur Ashish Deshmukh, after his audio tape – in which he has appealed voters to voter for a BJP candidate in Nagpur – emerged. Party’s working president and disciplinary committee member Chandrakant Handore will conduct the probe. Deshmukh had reportedly released the audio to appeal voters to vote for BJP’s Nileshkumar Dhote to the Nagpur DC.
