The Ram Mandir, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity, rising inflation, unemployment, and the farmers’ crisis — as in much of the rest of the country, these are the five most talked-about issues on ground by voters and political leaders alike in Maharashtra, where voters in five Lok Sabha constituencies will go to the polls on April 19.
The constituencies where voting will take place in the first phase are Nagpur, Ramtek (a seat reserved for Scheduled Castes), Chandrapur, Bhandara-Gondia, and Gadchiroli-Chimur (reserved for Scheduled Tribes), all in the Vidarbha region.
In 2019, the BJP-Shiv Sena coalition had won four of these seats, barring Chandrapur, the lone seat clinched by the Congress in the western State. While four of these seats will see a direct contest between BJP and Congress candidates this time around, Ramtek — which was represented twice by former Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao — is witnessing a electoral battle between the Congress and the Shiv Sena, led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde. Two more issues resonating among voters here are the impact of the Maratha reservation, and the internal splits in both the Shiv Sena and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).
