Muktainagar Election Result: Chandrakant Nimba Patil Secures Second Term (image:facebook.com/ChandrakantNPatil5)
Chandrakant Nimba Patil secured his second consecutive win from Muktainagar on Shiv Sena ticket. He defeated Rohini Khadse, daughter of senior politician Eknath Khadse, on a NCP (SCP) ticket. This was the second face off between Khadse and Patil.
In the 2019 polls, Patil defeated Khadse by a slight margin of 1,957 votes. He fought and won the election as an independent candidate. Before the 2019 polls win, he contested for the seat in 2014 but lost. In the 2014 assembly polls, he contested on a Shiv Sena ticket and secured second position with 75,949 votes. A Shiv Sena ally, he contested the current polls with the support of Shinde Sena.
Muktainagar constituency, located in Jalgaon district, was once a bastion of Eknath Khadse. He represented the seat from 1990 to 2019. The controversy concerning his alleged involvement in the MIDC land scam has shaken his political career in 2016. As per the BJP’s instruction, he had to quit his position as a state revenue minister and in the 2019 assembly polls, Khadse was replaced by Rohini as BJP candidate. He has been increasingly excluded from the BJP which then prompted his resignation and joining the NCP (SCP).
The 288 assembly seats in the State went to polls in a single phase on November 20 and 66.05% voter turnout was recorded.
The ruling Mahayuti consists of the BJP, the Chief Minister Eknath Shinde-led breakaway faction of the Shiv Sena, and the deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar’s faction of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). The opposition, the INDIA bloc’s MVA or the Maha Vikas Aghadi, has the Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray), or SS (UBT) led by former CM Uddhav Thackeray, the NCP (SP) faction led by Sharad Pawar and the Congress.
The BJP has fielded 149 candidates, Shiv Sena (Shinde) 81, and NCP (Ajit Pawar) 59. In the opposition, the Congress has fielded 101 candidates, Shiv Sena (UBT) 95, and NCP (Sharad Pawar) 86. In the 2019 Assembly elections, the BJP secured 105 seats, the undivided Shiv Sena 56, and the Congress 44. In 2014, the BJP won 122 seats, the Shiv Sena and the Congress garnered 63, and 42 seats, respectively.
