The mayoral contest of the Bhiwandi-Nizampur Municipal Corporation, scheduled for Friday, February 20, has taken a dramatic turn even before the first vote is cast, with shifting alliances reshaping the political balance inside the civic body.

Political equations changed sharply after nine corporators who recently broke away from the Bharatiya Janata Party extended their support to the Congress-led Bhiwandi Secular Front. Soon after, the Indian National Congress announced that the Samajwadi Party would no longer remain part of the front, following its decision to side with the Shiv Sena.

In a fresh move, Congress has named BJP rebel corporator Narayan Chaudhary as its official nominee for the mayor’s post and issued a whip asking all party corporators to vote in his favour. Congress group leader Tariq Momin has been put forward as the party’s candidate for deputy mayor.

The developments have injected fresh suspense into the Bhiwandi civic race, where no party secured a clear majority in the January 15 elections to the 90-member corporation. Congress had emerged as the single largest party with 30 seats, followed by the BJP with 22, the Nationalist Congress Party (Sharad Pawar) with 12 and the Samajwadi Party with six, while the remaining seats went to smaller parties and an independent.

The majority mark in the House stands at 46. Earlier, Congress had stitched together the Bhiwandi Secular Front with the NCP (SP) and SP, briefly pushing the alliance strength past the halfway line. However, internal disagreements over the mayor’s post led to the Samajwadi Party walking out of the arrangement.

With the backing of nine BJP rebels, Congress now claims the support of 51 corporators, a number that places it comfortably above the majority threshold even without SP’s participation. Maharashtra Congress president Harshwardhan Sapkal described the turn of events as a serious blow to the BJP, asserting that the rebel corporators had completely severed ties with the party and its ideology.

Sapkal said the party was confident of securing the mayor’s chair in Bhiwandi, calling it a significant morale boost after recent setbacks and noting that it would be the second municipal corporation, after Latur, where Congress succeeds in electing a mayor.