Dayashankar Tiwari elected 54th mayor of Nagpur

Nagpur: Veteran BJP corporator Dayashankar Tiwari and first-time corporator Manisha Dhawde of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were elected as the new mayor and deputy mayor in a special online meeting of Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) held on Tuesday at civic body headquarters.
Four-time corporator Tiwari is city’s 54th mayor, while Dhawad is the 56th deputy mayor. The election of BJP candidates was a foregone conclusion given the party’s more than two-thirds majority in the House.
With the NMC election due next year, expectations of the people and the party from Tiwari are going to be high.In a tenure of about 13 months (till the NMC elections in 2022), Tiwari will have to deal with a variety of crucial issues including the acute funds crunch being faced by the NMC.
Dhawde’s term as deputy mayor will be co-terminus with that of the mayor. Election was held following resignations by mayor Sandip Joshi of the BJP and deputy mayor Manisha Kothe last month.
BJP had a cakewalk in three-cornered contest. The election went on expected lines. BJP has 107 corporators in the 151-member House. Both Tiwari and Dhawde secured 107 votes each. BSP, which has 10 corporators and had fielded Narendra Walde and Vaishali Nitnaware, secured 10 votes each.
MVA alliance had fielded Manoj Gawande of Congress and Mangala Gaware of Shiv Sena for mayor and deputy mayor posts but they withdrew their nomination just before the election leaving the field to candidates Ramesh Punekar (mayor) and Rashmi Dhurve (deputy mayor) of Congress faction led by city party president Vikas Thakre to contest the election.
Four corporators were absent during the election.
Tiwari and Dhawade won by a difference of 70 and 71 votes respectively indicative of BJP’s unity in NMC. While Tiwari trounced Punekar, who secured 27 votes. Factionalism in Congress again reared its head as three of its corporators — Gargi Chopra, Bunty Shelke and Purshottam Hazare — remained absent.
While Chopra had already distanced herself from Congress, absence of Shelke could be due his presence at ongoing farmers’ protest over farm bill in New Delhi. Reason behind Hazare’s absence could not be explained by the Congress party.
In the three-cornered fight for deputy mayor’s post, Rashmi Dhurve of Congress got 26 votes. Congress corporator Kamlesh Chowdhary remained absent during the deputy mayor’s poll.
District election officer and district collector Ravindra Thakre conducted the online special meeting of Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) called for electing the mayor and deputy mayor.
After the meeting began, Thakre read out the names of contestants. A period of 15 minutes respectively was given for withdrawal of names. The online election was held with show of hands zone-wise. Five nominated members did not have the right to vote while the only independent corporator Abha Pande skipped the meeting.
Soon after the collector and election officer declared Tiwari and Dhawde’s elected as mayor and deputy mayor, party activists waiting outside the standing committee hall at the NMC headquarters burst crackers in celebration.