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The BJP announced on April 27 its decision to replace incumbent Lok Sabha MP Poonam Mahajan, daughter of former Union Minister late Pramod Mahajan, with lawyer Ujjwal Deorai Nikam for the Mumbai North Central Lok Sabha seat.
In 2014, Ms. Mahajan secured victory from the Mumbai North Central seat, triumphing over incumbent MP Priya Dutt, daughter of the late actor and Congress leader Sunil Dutt. She repeated this success in the 2019 general elections too. While Mr. Nikam, a known figure in the legal circles, served as a government counsel in the Mumbai terror attack case. She previously held the position of president of BJP’s youth wing.
While speculations of replacing the sitting MP have been circulating, BJP leaders said that the party’s search for her successor was time-consuming and cited organisational feedback as the rationale behind her replacement.
The announcement comes two days after the Congress nominated its Mumbai unit chief and Dharavi MLA Varsha Gaikwad as the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) candidate for the seat.
The Western State sends 48 MPs to the Lower House, the largest number after Uttar Pradesh’s 80, and polling was held for 13 seats in the first and second phases. The State will vote in three more phases between May 7 and May 20 and voting in Mumbai is scheduled for May 20.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP won 23 out of 25 contested seats, while the undivided Shiv Sena secured 18 out of 23 seats.
