Exit polls released after the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) elections held on Thursday have projected a victory for the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance, with the Thackeray brothers placed second and the Congress and its allies failing to put up a strong showing.
According to Axis My India estimates, the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance is in a position to win 131-151 seats; Shiv Sena (UBT)-MNS-NCP (SP) alliance 58-68 seats; Congress-VBA-RSP alliance 12-16 seats; And others may win 6-12 seats. Elections were held for 227 seats of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), and any party or alliance needs 114 seats for a simple majority.
Axis My India also estimated vote share, estimating 42% vote share for the Mahayuti allies (BJP 28%, Shiv Sena 14%). It projected Shiv Sena (UBT) to get 24 percent votes, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) to get 7 percent and NCP (SP) to get 1 percent. The three parties contested the elections in alliance.
According to DV Research, the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance is likely to get 107-122 seats; Thackeray brothers’ alliance gets 68-83 seats; Congress-led alliance gets 18-25 seats; And others are likely to get 8-15 seats.
According to Janmat exit polls, BJP and Shiv Sena are likely to get 138 seats; Shiv Sena (UBT)-MNS-NCP (SP) alliance gets 62 seats; Congress-led alliance gets 20 seats; And others may get 7 seats. It is estimated in this poll that there may be an error of five seats in the estimate.
Saam TV’s exit poll has predicted BJP to get 84 seats, its ally Shiv Sena to get 35 seats, Shiv Sena (UBT) to get 65 seats, NCP (SP) to get two seats and MNS to get ten seats. It said that Congress will get 23 seats, NCP will get three seats and others will get five seats.
Maharashtra held elections for 29 municipal corporations, including the prestigious Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), with the stakes high for the Thackeray brothers as well as the BJP-Shiv Sena following the ruling Mahayuti alliance’s landslide victory in the assembly elections last year.
Counting of votes will take place on Friday.
Voting was held in 227 wards in the capital Mumbai, in which around 1,700 candidates were in the fray. A total of 1,03,44,315 citizens were eligible to vote in the BMC elections.
The undivided Shiv Sena was a strong force in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation. In the last elections held in 2007, it had won 84 seats, while the BJP had won 82. This is the first BMC election in 2022 after the Shiv Sena split. For the Thackeray brothers, Raj and Uddhav, these local body elections were a fight to regain lost prestige. The results will decide whether the Thackeray surname holds as much significance in the city and state today as it once did. The coming together of the two cousins was considered to be the final bet on the legacy of the Thackeray dynasty.
The scions of the Thackeray family had projected the fight as a fight of the ‘Marathi Manush’ against the alleged corporate nexus of the BJP-Sena alliance. The Bharatiya Janata Party contested the BMC elections in alliance with the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena. The election was also being seen as a vote in support of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis’s development plans, given a well-planned election campaign and the BJP’s massive electoral machinery in support of the grand alliance.
