In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Maharashtra is a crucial state after Uttar Pradesh as it holds 48 seats. The ‘Mahayuti’ government in the state, under the leadership of CM Eknath Shinde, aims to win 45 seats.
After establishing a strong hold in the Hindi belt, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is confident that they have the support of the people and a chance to retain power for the third time under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Centre.
In the last elections, the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) won 41 seats. After the split in the Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), the Shinde and Ajit Pawar factions of the two parties have joined the ‘Mahayuti’ government. This government will contest the elections under the leadership of Shinde, but all know that the BJP will have the last word.
The Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) claims that they have reached the last round of talks of seat sharing, while there are no such meetings regularly taking place in the ‘Mahayuti’ between the BJP, Shiv Sena and NCP (Ajit Pawar).
ON GROUND
The Lok Sabha elections will not be a cakewalk for the BJP in Maharashtra. On the one side, the BJP wants to have the lion’s share in the number of seats, while on the other, the Shinde-led Sena wants to contest at least 23-25 seats, as it will be an issue of prestige for them to create space in the minds of ‘Marathi’ people as the ‘Shiv Sena of Balasaheb Thackeray’.
The NCP faction, which joined the ‘Mahayuti’ last year with nine cabinet berths, wants to win more seats in the state to reduce the sympathy towards the Sharad Pawar-led faction of the party.
THE 2019 FORMULAE
In 2019, the BJP had contested 25 seats and won 23, with a voting percentage of approximately 27.84. The Shiv Sena had contested 23 seats and won 18, with a voting percentage of 23.05. The NCP had contested 19 seats and won 4, with a voting percentage of 15.66.
Still, Ajit Pawar was brought into this alliance as the BJP central leadership thinks that Shinde, despite getting the party symbol and name, has not been able to generate enough traction to reduce the Uddhav Thackeray sympathy wave in rural areas. With the help of the NCP, the BJP wants to win maximum seats in rural areas, especially in Western Maharashtra.
Despite this clarity, the seat-sharing talks are yet to be finalised. Ajit Pawar, during the two-day convention of his party in December, said that his faction will contest all four seats won by the NCP in 2019 — Satara, Shirur, Baramati and Raigad. He further said they will be asking for some more seats where they have strong candidates and have a chance of winning. Sources in the party said that the NCP intends to contest at least 12 seats.
The Shiv Sena, which had contested 23 seats, is also looking to contest between 23-25 seats.
BJP’s BIG PLANS
The BJP may, however, not allow such big ambitions of its alliance partners. “The BJP has set a target of 45+, for which they want to contest maximum seats," a source in the party said, adding, “They have been working on the election strategy for the past two years. They have created over 90,000 booth heads, and ‘Panna Pramukhs’ have been appointed and given responsibilities."
The party has also listed new faces who they feel have a ‘winning factor’, as ‘winnability’ will be the main factor in Maharashtra. So no one should be surprised if old faces get replaced. The same source also said that according to the internal party discussion, the party may increase its seat quota compared to the last election, as they believe the situation is in favour of the BJP.
To appeal to the voters, PM Modi made a quick visit to different parts of the state in the past two weeks. On January 10, he visited Nashik, Mumbai and Navi Mumbai and inaugurated big-ticket infrastructure projects, along with laying the foundation stone of other small projects.
Just a few days ago, he came to Solapur district to hand over the keys of homes made under the affordable housing scheme of the Centre. This indicates how important Maharashtra is to the BJP.
In such a scenario, the BJP will not give away its alliance partners the seats they desire. Instead, the BJP will keep a maximum of 30-35 seats and later ask alliance partners to distribute the remaining seats equally by including smaller parties like the Republican Party of India (Athavle) and others.
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