Will Pune Get New Ministers? Names of Madhuri Misal, Mahesh Landge, Vijay Shivtare in Line

The Mahayuti — an alliance of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Ajit Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), and Eknath Shinde’s faction of Shiv Sena — has secured a landslide victory in Pune by winning 18 Assembly seats out of the 21 in the district. This has sparked significant interest among Punekars about how many more ministers the city and district might have in the new government.

Currently, Pune district is represented by three ministers: Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, Higher and Technical Education Minister Chandrakant Patil, and Cooperation Minister Dilip Walse Patil.

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A total of 18 Mahayuti MLAs from Pune district are part of the new government, and Madhuri Misal and Bhimrao Tapkir are returning to the assembly for the fourth time.

Speculation is rife about whether former Ministers of State Vijay Shivtare and Dattatreya Bharne will be reappointed, with the outcome yet to be seen. The names of Mahesh Landge from Bhosari and Sunil Shelke from Maval are also circulating as potential candidates for a ministerial post.

Meanwhile, the victory margins in the Pune district reveal a mix of significant and narrow wins across various constituencies. Several candidates secured decisive victories with margins exceeding 100,000 votes, such as Mahesh Landge (BJP) in Bhosari, who won by 63,765 votes, and Shankar Jagtap (BJP) in Chinchwad, with a commanding margin of 103,865 votes.

In contrast, there were more closely contested races, with some winners emerging victorious by margins between 5,000 and 60,000, including Bhimrao Tapkir (BJP) in Khadakwasla, who won by 52,322 votes. Tough contests were seen in Hadapsar, where Chetan Tupe (NCP) won by 7,122 votes, and in Vadgaon Sheri, where Bapusaheb Pathare (NCP-SP) secured a narrow win by just 4,710 votes.

The vote margin that made news in rural Pune was in Ambegaon. In what can be termed a neck-and-neck fight, NCP-AP’s Dilip Walse Patil narrowly escaped defeat with a margin of just 1,500 votes, as NCP-SP’s Devdatta Nikam gave him a tough challenge. Walse Patil, a former home minister, first became an MLA in 1990 from Ambegaon on a Congress ticket and has since then been elected as an MLA six times from the constituency.