The Bharatiya Janata Party announced on Saturday 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 a 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 electoral success in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections as well. Ms. Mahajan had previously held been the president of BJP’s youth wing.
Mr. Nikam, a known figure in the legal circles, has served as a government counsel in the Mumbai terror attacks case.
While speculations of replacing the sitting MP have been circulating, BJP leaders said that the party’s search for Ms. Mahajan’s successor was time-consuming. Organisational feedback was also cited as a rationale for 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.
“I will always be indebted to the people of the area for loving me not only as an MP but also as a daughter. I hope that this relationship will always remain. My role model was my late father Pramod Mahajanji, who showed me the path of ‘nation first, then us’. I pray to God that I can follow the same path throughout my life. Every moment of my life will always be dedicated to the service of this country,” Ms. Mahajan wrote in a post shared on X (formerly Twitter).
The western State of Maharashtra sends 48 MPs to the Lower House, the largest number after Uttar Pradesh’s 80. Polling was held for 13 of these 48 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 election, the BJP won 23 out of 25 contested seats, while the undivided Shiv Sena secured 18 out of 23 seats.
