E-Paper
Mumbai can tip the scales
Bombay meri hai, goes the popular song. But Mumbai kiski hogi? That's the million dollar question. For this metropolis ? which accounts for 34 of the state assembly's 288 seats ? will make all the difference to the fortunes of the two alliances, writes Sujata Anandan.
Bombay meri hai, goes the popular song. But Mumbai kiski hogi? That's the million dollar question. For this metropolis — which accounts for 34 of the state assembly's 288 seats — will make all the difference to the fortunes of the two alliances.
And this is presumption based on history. When Sharad Pawar first split the Congress in 1978, then CM Vasantdada Patil had a tough time keeping the party's head above water. At the next elections, Patil thought he'd lost for sure when Pawar's Progressive Democratic Front bagged 134 seats against the Congress' 123, with only Mumbai left. But the Congress took 31 seats in Mumbai and Pawar had to sit in the opposition.
The story was repeated in 1995, when the Shiv Sena-BJP drew with the Congress in the rest of the state but swept 33 seats in Mumbai. Then again in 1999, five seats from Mumbai made all the difference.
This is why the Congress and the NCP fought so hard over seats in Mumbai, why Pawar shot down the proposal of ‘friendly fights’ by his men when the Congress refused to give him more than seven seats and why he swallowed his pride and settled for eight.
But while Mumbai may tilt the national fortunes of parties, it votes locally. Ask sports minister Sunil Dutt. Wherever he went during his last campaign, people whined about leaking taps and overflowing gutters.
Now it is the Sena who is fending these complaints. And its concern is greater because it controls the municipal corporation.
The Mumbai vote is about more than just roads though. Four decades of Bal Thackeray's politics rests on the way the city swings. And the Sena chief is neck-deep in trouble with rebellion by former mayors and corporators.
The Sena won Mumbai in 1995 because of its role as protector during the 1993 riots and its promise of free housing to slum-dwellers. The housing scheme fell by the way.
