Mumbai - Now, the alliance between Shiv Sena and BJP has officially ended. Both these parties will fight the BMC polls on their own might after 1992 civic elections. The Congress party had bagged power with a clear majority in the BMC as these saffron parties fought separately then. Now, with the splitting of these rivals, it would be interesting to see whether Congress will take benefit of this situation or the groupism will drown the party even in this favourable situation.
The Shiv Sena-BJP alliance was formed in 1989 but both these parties had fought the civic elections separately in 1992. The Congress party had secured 112 seats in that election while Shiv Sena had bagged 69 seats. The count of other was parties was: BJP – 14; Janata Dal – 8; CPI – 2; Muslim League – 5; and Kamgar Aghadi – 1. Congress corporator Chandrakant Handore had become Mayor followed by Nirmala Sawant Prabhawalkar, R T Kadam, R R Singh for next three years. In the last year’s mayoral poll, Congress group including Vijay Loke and others had voted in favour of Shiv Sena’s mayoral candidate Milind Vaidya. Since then, the Congress party has been away from power in the BMC. The Congress party can wrest power from these now separately fighting parties. Though groupism is not new to the Congress party and many outgoing corporators have deserted the party, it has a chance to repeat the history of 1992 if it takes parties like the NCP, the Samajwadi Party along in these elections.
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