Lok Sabha elections 2019: Doctor fights to save lives, engineer for infra

Raies Khan, a 46-year-old doctor who practises alternative medicine and runs a clinic in Borivli, said he decided to contest the elections to highlight the key issues of common man.

An engineer working for a multinational company and a doctor are among the independent candidates in the fray from Mumbai North for the upcoming Lok Sabha (LS) elections.

Lok Sabha elections 2019: Doctor fights to save lives, engineer for infra

Of the 22 candidates who have filed their nominations from the constituency, six are independents who are pitting themselves against the two big contestants – BJP’s sitting MP Gopal Shetty and Congress’s star candidate Urmila Matondkar.

Raies Khan, a 46-year-old doctor who practises alternative medicine and runs a clinic in Borivli, said he decided to contest the elections to highlight the key issues of common man. “Over the past few years, all parties and candidates that have come to power have done barely anything to address basic issues. The constituency needs a fully functional government hospital and better transport facilities,” said Khan.

Khan has decided to keep his clinic closed for the next few days to campaign.

Milind Repe, a 57-year-old engineer from Kandivli who works for a multinational company, decided to contest as an independent for the second time in a row, as he felt the current leadership across prominent parties was inefficient. “Some very basic issues of people living in the suburbs – traffic congestion, lack of commercial complexes – are on my agenda,” said Repe.

He said the changed rules of the Election Commission are making it difficult for independent candidates to complete formalities in time. “The EC wants a daily statement of expenses in hard copies for which independent candidates have to travel for four hours every day,” he said. A daily wage labourer, Vilas Hiwale, and a 74-year-old senior citizen Bhagavatidan Gadhavi are among the other candidates.