The Hindu Business Line : BJP, Sena lose urban votes but pick a rural flavour

THE poll results from Maharashtra more or less run counter to the trends in rest of the country, with the BJP-Sena, two of the oldest partners, standing the ground effectively though they and the Congress (I)-NCP lost big-ticket candidates like former speakers - Mr Manohar Joshi and Mr Shivraj Patil - the Union Ministers, Mr Ram Naik, Ms Jaywantiben Mehta, and several enduring figures in Maharashtra's politics such as Mr Praful Patel, Mr R.S. Gavai and Mr Prakash Ambedkar.

The Chief Minister, Mr Sushilkumar Shinde's wife, Ms Ujwala, too lost.

The winners include the first-time candidate, described as `the most non-serious', Govinda Ahuja, won the Mumbai North seat. Another biggie, erstwhile screen hero Mr Sunil Dutt made it to the winner's rank again. So did newcomer Mr Milind Deora, whose father, Mr Murli Deora, is already in the Rajya Sabha.

Mr Balasaheb Vikhe-Patil, former Union Minister, who switched back to Congress (I) from the Shiv Sena, won the Kopargaon seat by about one- lakh votes margin. Mr Anant Gite and Mr Suresh Prabhu too won.

Though the Congress (I) and the NCP allied together against the Shiv Sena and the BJP in Maharashtra, the arithmetic did not quite add up and gave them and an ally, the Republican Party of India, only a total of the 23 of the 48 Lok Sabha seats.

On the other hand, the Sena-BJP, despite a strong anti-NDA mood in the country, won 25 seats, which are just four short of its strength in the 13th Lok Sabha. There are several interesting facets to the outcome of one of the most-bitter elections in the State in recent times.

One, the Shiv Sena and the BJP lost their grip on the urban seats - Thane, Pune, Nashik, Nagpur and all except one in Mumbai - though the urban areas were seen as more receptive to the NDA's `India Shining' concept. The two parties swept the entire Vidharbha region by taking 10 of the 11 seats and yielded just two of the eight in Marathwada.

Unlike in the past, the Sena-BJP gains have a distinct rural flavour this time.

Above all, it was conceded soon after the big picture emerged in Maharashtra that the ruling alliance here running the State Government had not anticipated the anger at its handling - or mis-handling - of an intense drought.

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