Congress claims it has won 25 municipal councils on its own

Mumbai, Nov 21 (UNI) The Congress has claimed it has won 25 Municipal Councils on its own while at 22 other places it can come to power with allies support.

The Bharatiya Janata Party, on the other hand, said it was in a position to stake claim for the presidentship of 19 Municipal Ccouncils.

The municipal elections in the state has seen the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party surging way ahead of BJP and Shiv Sena. The Congress has won the maximum seats followed closely by the NCP.

Talking to reporters here today, Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee president Prabha Rau said the strength of her party had increased considerably in comparison to 2001. The Congress had 802 councillors in 2001, while the number has increased to 903 now, she said.

Meanwhile, state BJP general-secretary Vinod Tavade told reporters that 426 BJP candidates had been elected as councillors -- 309 as official party candidates while 117 others as candidates of various fronts.

The defeat in the Municipal Council elections, however, has had the Shiv Sena blaming it on the changed method of electing presidents to these civic bodies.

Sena executive president Uddhav Thackeray, in a statement here, said his party had secured nearly 400 seats on its own, which is almost at par with the BJP. The party, he said, had suffered a setback due to the changed method of election method.

While accepting defeat, Mr Thackeray, however, wondered as to how the Congress and the NCP could have won so many seats when the Congress-NCP government in the state had failed to address the issues faced by the common man.

''How they secured so many votes, is a matter of investigation,'' he said in a statement.

He said the results of the Municipal Council elections did not imply a verdict by the state and efforts would be made to strengthen the party.

Leader of the Opposition in the State Legislative Assembly Ramdas Kadam had yesterday resigned from his post accepting moral responsibility for the Sena's defeat in Khed in Ratnagiri district, which is his home constituency.

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