Opposition sees poaching as Eknath Shinde shifts BMC winners to hotel

Mumbai: In a significant development the Shiv Sena has moved its 29 corporators who have won in the Mumbai Municipal Corporation polls to a hotel in Mumbai. The move has raised eyebrows especially as the BJP on its own is short of coming to power in the BMC and needs its ally the Shiv Sena's support.

The Shiv Sena shinde camp claimed that they had gathered the Corporators in a Hotel for a 'celebration'.

The BJP has got 89 corporators and the majority needed in the 227 member house is 114.


Meanwhile Uddhav Thackeray of the UBT Sena claimed that the BJP might even poach some corporators from the Shiv Sena by breaking the party to get its Mayor in the BMC.s' Things will get interesting now, we will see whether they share the Mayor's post between the two parties for 2.5 years or the BJP break their (Shiv Sena) and get their Mayor for five years."

Referring to the Shiv Sena Mumbai corporators staying in a Hotel in Bandra, Thackeray said, "Those who have broken our party are now afraid of getting their own party being broken."

Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said that nothing should not be read into the Shiv Sena corporators being herded into a hotel and that there would be no poaching. "There would be no poaching at all, we will take all decisions in consultation with each other (Shiv Sena). Don't read too much into their corporators being called, we have also called our corporators for a meeting."said Fadnavis.

NCP factions Weigh Merger
Faced with an embarrassing defeat in spite of aligning with the Nationalist Congress Party(SP) the two Nationalist Congress party factions have begun discussing merging back into one party.

Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar has met Sharad Pawar and Supriya Sule behind closed doors after the results. The two NCP factions performed poorly in the recently held civic polls even though they contested in an alliance for the Pune and Pimpri Chinchwad polls.

Ajit Pawar has held close door discussions with Sule in Baramati and also has met Sharad Pawar. For now, the two parties have decided that they would be contesting the upcoming 12 zilla parishad elections in an alliance.

"What our discussions were behind closed doors, we cannot tell you."said Sule when asked by reporters about Ajit and her meeting. She however added that talks were going on between the leaders of the two parties on merging into one party.