Betrayal and ballot boxes: the crisis of Maharashtra’s urban local body polls

“The municipal corporation elections in Maharashtra this time have the hallmarks of a third-grade Bollywood thriller… political promiscuity at its worst,” wrote Girish Kuber, editor of Loksatta. As someone who has observed the city closely for a long time, he believes what is happening this time in the run up to the civic elections on 15 January is unprecedented, with some candidates changing parties three times a day.

He cites the example of two local satraps loyal to the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena, who celebrated the reunion of the Thackeray brothers (Uddhav and Raj) by publicly vowing to “drown the BJP in the Ganga”. The very next day, however, they were found in the BJP camp promising supporters that they would finish the Shiv Sena (UBT).

Out of 29 municipal corporations going to polls on 15 January, the BJP has fielded 337 candidates imported from other parties, upsetting its own supporters. In several cities, BJP offices were attacked and ransacked, ministers’ vehicles blackened, and at least on one occasion, party functionaries who had released letters of authorisation to candidates had to flee as disgruntled hopefuls and supporters chased their vehicles.

In Nagpur, BJP candidate Kishan Gawande was asked by the party to withdraw his nomination in favour of a defector. This angered his supporters, who locked him up in his own residence to prevent him from going out to withdraw from the fray.

The ‘party with a difference’ has had no problem embracing history-sheeters, habitual defectors, and fielding many candidates with ‘questionable reputations’. Political scientist Suhas Palshikar tweeted, “How do BJP supporters reconcile with the fact that sex offenders are party representatives and the party doesn't disown them? How do we as a society reconcile to convenient bails and paroles to sex convicts?”

The mad scramble to get the official nomination from the Mahayuti is easy to explain. Elections have not been held in most of these municipal corporations for the last five-six years. Local strongmen have been restless, since administrators and bureaucrats called the shots in the absence of any restraining influence by elected representatives. They are anxious to get a slice of the pie and what better guarantee to win the election than getting the official nomination of the three parties in power, which also have the required money power?

Another reason, or even the most important reason, for the madness on display is the money at the disposal of these corporations. For the sake of comparison, the Kolkata Municipal Corporation’s annual budget of Rs 5,639 crore is less than half the budget of the Pune Municipal Corporation’s Rs 12,618 crore.

Similarly, the budget for the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) is around Rs 17,000 crore, while that of BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) is a staggering Rs 75,000 crore. Competition among political parties and corporators for cuts, commissions, contracts is therefore fiercer than elsewhere in the country. Budgets of Navi Mumbai corporation (Rs 5,700 crore) and Nagpur (Rs 5,400 crore) are not insubstantial either.

The BJP and the undivided Shiv Sena jointly controlled the BMC since 1999 and can be called ‘partners in crime’. However, in this year’s election, the Mahayuti has framed the poll as a referendum against the corruption of the Shiv Sena (UBT) in the BMC.

The ruling coalition is confident of repeating its success in the 2024 Assembly election, and in the smaller municipalities for which elections were held in late 2025. In both, the coalition won two-third of the seats and since it is also in power in the state, it hopes to sweep the BMC and other bigger municipal corporations too.

Not leaving anything to chance, the Mahayuti has pulled out all stops. Assembly speaker Rahul Narvekar has been accused of arm-twisting returning officers to prevent Opposition candidates from filing nominations. Narvekar reportedly forced his way into the RO’s chamber and spent an inordinately long time there to thwart candidates waiting outside to file their papers within the stipulated time.

Raj Thackeray's Maharashtra Nirman Sena (MNS) also complained that a police officer escorted one of the MNS candidates to have an audience with deputy chief minister Eknath Shinde. After the meeting, the candidate reportedly withdrew his nomination.

Marathi poet Hemant Divte recalls that earlier, ‘elected unopposed’ signalled wide acceptability and respect in society. What is happening today is not honourable. It is an insult to the electorate. With elections being ‘engineered’, voters, he points out, are being denied their right to elect representatives of their choice.

The disappointment is shared by first-time voter Dilip Rane and his friends, who were looking forward to exercising their franchise. Although the state election commission has ordered an inquiry into the 68 councillors elected unopposed and withheld the results until it is complete, there is scepticism over the outcome.

The elections have exposed the flawed electoral system which has been corroding city governance. While citizens fume and call for either a boycott or a vote for NOTA (None of the Above), political parties, especially those in power, seemingly couldn't care less.