Mumbai election buzz: City set for multi-cornered BMC fight as nominations close; alliances trigger last-minute scramble

MUMBAI: With seat sharing within two major alliances (BJP-Shiv Sena and Shiv Sena UBT-MNS) finalised only late on Monday, the final day of filing nominations for the BMC polls on Tuesday saw a last-minute scramble for submission of forms. Several candidates were still in queue at 6pm to submit their duly-filled papers. Those who had queued up before the 5pm deadline were entitled to file their papers.

In all, 1,668 candidates filed their forms on Tuesday for the Jan 15 polls to the country's richest civic body which will see a multi-cornered fight. Till a day ago, only 401 had filed papers. The last date for withdrawal is Jan 2, 2026.

While there are three principal alliances in the fray - BJP-Shiv Sena, Sena (UBT)-MNS-NCP (SP), and Congress-Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi - two other political forces fighting on their own are NCP helmed by deputy CM Ajit Pawar and the Ramdas Athavale-led RPI(A). NCP, which has limited presence in Mumbai and is not part of the Mahayuti this time, has fielded 94 candidates (see gfx) for the total 227 BMC seats.




RPI, which has been with Mahayuti at the Centre and the state levels, has demanded 12 seats from BJP’s quota and said it will otherwise contest 38 on its own in a ‘friendly fight’.

While candidates who filed nominations are expected to hit the campaign ground running on Wednesday, netas have the task of pacifying rebels who are significant in number across parties because of the alliances that have been stitched together, permitting nomination from one party in an alliance in a single ward.

While parties have until Jan 2 to get rebels to withdraw their papers, political rallies will take off from the start of the new year. With campaigning ending in the evening of Jan 13, parties and alliances have close to two weeks to drum up support for themselves.

Of the major parties, only Congress, NCP and NCP (SP) released official lists of candidates; the rest distributed AB (party) forms to nominees directly in a bid to avoid rebellion.

The BJP-Shiv Sena arrived at a 137-90 seatsharing arrangement after a week of negotiations, and the Sena led by Dy CM Eknath Shinde-led Sena distributed AB forms to all its 90 candidates early Tuesday. It has fielded almost all 40-odd former corporators who have switched over from the Uddhav Thackeray-led Sena (UBT).

The Sena (UBT) and MNS have finalised a 165-52 pact, with 10 seats set aside for the Sharad Pawar-led NCP (SP). The MNS too distributed AB forms to its candidates on Monday night. The Congress is contesting 167 seats, and its ally VBA 60. Most Congress candidates had filed their forms on Monday; the rest did so on Tuesday.

Defections and rebellions continued on the final day of filing nominations, with some candidates jumping ship at the last moment and being rewarded with tickets by rivals.

The BMC election is a high-stakes battle especially for the Thackeray cousins who are fighting for political survival.