In a big jolt to the Congress on Wednesday, former Maharashtra Chief Minister and senior leader Narayan Rane lost the Assembly by-election by a margin of about 19,000 votes from Bandra (East) constituency.
In Tasgaon by-election in western Maharashtra, NCP candidate Suman Patil won by a comfortable margin of over 1 lakh votes.
Rane, who is know for his confrontationist politics, had been trying to regain his position as an MLA from Bandra (E) in suburban Mumbai, which is a stronghold of Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray.
The Thackeray family has been traditionally running the party from the
For Rane, the by-election was a fight for political survival, as last year he had lost the Assembly election in Sindhudurg in coastal Maharashtra to the Sena’s Vaibhav Naik by a margin of 9,000 votes.
Trupti Sawant, widow of MLA Prakash Sawant, whose death necessitated the by-election in Bandra (E), won the seat with a comfortable margin. The constituency consists of a large State government employee colony that is a Sena stronghold.
Rane had started his political career in the Shiv Sena. But after a bitter feud in July 2005 with Sena founder Bal Thackeray, he had quit the party to join the Congress, where he continued his tirade against Thackeray and his family. His decision to fight the by-election was a direct challenge to Uddhav and his party.
Sena workers celebrated the defeat of Rane by busting crackers. Uddhav said the election has once again shown that the Shiv Sena is a tiger and no one should try to mess with it. Sawant’s poll promises will be fulfilled, he said.
In Tasgaon, Suman Patil, widow of former Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister RR Patil secured 112,000 votes, comfortably defeating BJP rebel candidate Swapnil Patil. The by-election was necessitated by the death of RR Patil in February.