Suresh Bhoyar To Challenge BJP State Chief Chandrashekhar Bawankule In Kamthi (image:facebook.com/SureshBhoyar)

As Maharashtra BJP President Chandrashekhar Bawankule is aiming for a comeback from Kamthi (also spelled Kamptee), his home turf in the Vidarbha region, Congress has nominated Suresh Bhoyar to pose a tough challenge to the former.

Bhoyar is a former president of the Nagpur Zila Panchayat. In the 2019 Assembly elections, he contested from the Kamthi seat for the first time but lost. BJP candidate Tekchand Sawarkar won from the seat, securing 1,18,182 votes, while Bhoyar retreated to the second position, garnering 1,07,066 votes.

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Bhoyar maintains a special connection to the seat because his father, Yadavrao Bhoyar, won from the constituency in 1985 and 1990. Bhoyar hopes that in the upcoming polls, he will be able to capitalise anti-incumbency sentiment against Bawankule, who previously held the constituency.

Kamthi was founded in 1821 when the British developed it as a military cantonment. Located along the banks of the Kanhar River on the outskirts of Nagpur, Kamthi is a part of the Ramtek Lok Sabha constituency.

Since the debut Assembly elections in 1962, Kamthi was considered as a Congress stronghold for a long time. In 1995, independent candidate Deorao Radke won the seat, breaking the grand old party’s dominion on the sat. In 1999, the Republican Party of India’s Sulekha Kumbhare emerged as the winner. In 2004, the BJP secured victory in the constituency for the first time and has been retaining the seat till now.

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The 288 Assembly seats in Maharashtra will go to polls on November 20 and counting of votes will take place on November 23. The Assembly elections mark first one in the state after Shiv Sena and  NCP split in 2022, and 2023 respectively.

The ruling Mahayuti alliance 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 alliance comprise the INDIA bloc’s MVA or the Maha Vikas Aghadi, which 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.