Maharashtra: BJP wins Latur, Chandrapur; Congress wins Prabhani

In a historic victory, the BJP on Friday won Latur and Chandrapur seats out of three civic elections in Maharashtra.

Mumbai, April 21: In a historic victory, the BJP on Friday won Latur and Chandrapur seats while the Congress won Prabhani seat from the NCP, out of three municipal corporations in Maharashtra.

On April 19, Chandrapur, Latur and Parbhani held civic polls. The stakes were especially high for the ruling BJP as it was not in power in any of these three corporations and was looking to make inroads.

The elated Chief Minister of Maharashtra, 46-year-old Devendra Fadnavis took to the Twitter to express his happiness. He tweeted, "We will work harder and continue to work for every citizen with our mantra of good governance to serve the last man !"

In Chandrapur in Vidarbha, the BJP won 32 and Congress won 17 of the 66 seats. Chandrapur is the home turf of senior BJP leader and Finance Minister Sudhir Mungantiwar. Till now, Congress was in power in this 66-member civic body. As many as 460 candidates were in the fray whose fates were decided by 3.02 lakh voters.

The BJP won 40 out of 70-seats in Latur. It was a test of political clout for BJP leader and state minister Sambhajirao Nilangekar and the local Congress MLA Amit Deshmukh. In 2012 polls, ‪‪the BJP had not won any seat in Latur.

Congress, which controlled the corporation, had got a drubbing in the recent local body polls in Latur district. The city had faced acute water crisis last year and government had to transport water by railway waggons at the peak of summer.

In Latur, 407 candidates were in the fray whose fate was decided by 2.78 lakh voters.

In the 65-member Parbhani municipal corporation, the battle was mainly between the incumbent NCP and Shiv Sena. It was a test for district guardian minister and senior Sena leader Diwakar Raote. There were 418 candidates in the fray; number of voters was 2.12 lakh.

OneIndia News