The BJP has announced three candidates for the March 27 state council by-polls, blending experience with youth. While old guard Dadarao Keche, a former MLA from Arvi (Wardha), has been nominated, the party has also also decided to introduce two fresh faces, Sandeep Joshi and Sanjay Kenekar.

Keche’s nomination follows his withdrawal from the state assembly elections last November, reportedly in exchange for a promise of a state council seat. His decision paved the way for Sumit Wankhede, former OSD to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, to contest and win the Arvi seat by over 40,000 votes.

Sandeep Joshi, former mayor of Nagpur, has been a close associate of Fadnavis for over two decades. He lost Nagpur Graduate Constituency– a BJP bastion since ages to Congress candidate Abhijeet Wanjari in a close fight in 2020.

Sanjay Kenekar is a loyal party member from Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar and has been active in city politics. The decision to nominate Kenekar is an indication of the BJP’s intention to consolidate its position in city politics, which was once dominated by the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena for over three decades.

While announcing the three names, the party has once again ignored veteran leaders like Madhav Bhandari, whose name the state unit said to have recommended. Bhandari has served the party in different roles, such as spokesperson, vice president, etc.

On the other hand, the Ajit Pawar-led NCP and the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena will get one seat each in the by-election. There have been too many aspirants for the NCP as the winning candidate will be getting five years, the highest considered to the other candidates. The party is believed to have asked former Bandra East MLA Zeeshan Siddiqi, Umesh Patil (Solapur) and Sanjay Daund (Beed) to get the papers ready to file a nomination.

From the Shiv Sena camp, the name of former MLC Chandrakant Raghuwanshi (Nandurbar) is doing rounds. A former Congressman, Raghuwanshi is a known figure in North Maharashtra politics. The other names under consideration are those of former BMC corporator Sheetal Mhatre and Kiran Pandav from Nagpur.

The by-elections were necessitated after Pravin Datke, Ramesh Karad, Gopichand Padalkar (all from BJP), Amashya Padvi (Shiv Sena) and Rajesh Vitekar (NCP) got elected to the state assembly in November last year.

The last day for filing nominations by candidates is March 17. The last date of scrutiny of nominations is March 18, while candidates can withdraw from the contest on March 20. If needed, voting will take place on March 27.