BJP Faces Setback in Pune as Ex-MLA Bappu Saheb Pathare Joins NCP-SP Ahead of Maharashtra Assembly Elections 2024

The Bhartiya Janta Party in Pune city has suffered a huge loss as Ex- MLA and senior leader Bappu Saheb Pathare joins the Nationalist Congress Party (Sharad Pawar) along with Surendra Bapusaheb Pathare and former corporators Mahendra Pathare, Bhaiyasaheb Jadhav, Mahadev Pathare three other ex-corporators of the Pune Municipal Corporation.

Pathare joined the NCP (SP) in the presence of MP Supriya Sule, Sharad Pawar and other senior leaders. Pathare joining the NCP (SP) is considered a big blow to the BJP in Pune city as Pathare who is two times MLA from the Vadgaonsheri constituency and was also the first MLA who represented the Vadgaonsheri assembly constituency after the delimitation.

Bapusaheb Pathare was elected from the Vadgaon Sheri Assembly constituency on the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) ticket in 2009. In 2014, BJP's Jagdish Mulik defeated Pathare. Mulik received a 30.23% vote share with 66908 votes in 2014 while current MLA Sunil Tingre who then contested on the Shiv Sena ticket received a 27.83% vote share with 61,583 votes and NCP’s Bapusaheb Pathare got 20.1% vote share with 44,480 votes.

However, in 2019, Pathare joined the BJP as MLA Sunil Tingre was given the ticket from the NCP to contest from Vadgaon Sheri constituency. Tinge won the 2019 assembly election and received 97,708 votes while former MLA Jagdish Mulik was in second place with 92,752 votes.

Now that the NCP has been divided into two factions after Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar’s split with his uncle. It is likely that the current seat will go to NCP (AP) as MLA Sunil Tingre who is the standing MLA from Wadgaonsheri as Tingre has joined Ajit Pawar after the split. Hence it is highly possible that NCP (SP) will field Ex-MLA Bappusaheb Pathare in the upcoming assembly elections. However, as the BJP-NCP(AP) and Shiv Sena (Shinde faction) have decided to contest the polls together the stand of ex-MLA Jagdish Mulik is yet to be disclosed.