Congress's Wanjari wins Nagpur graduates' seat by 3,271 votes; thousands of ballots marked '2' for Kohale void

The BJP has lost the Nagpur division graduates' constituency election for the second consecutive time. Congress candidate and sitting MLA Abhijit Wanjari defeated the BJP's Sudhakar Kohale by 3,271 votes. More than the margin, however, what is being discussed is that around seven thousand votes meant for Kohale were rendered invalid.

Around six to seven thousand voters wrote 2 instead of 1 against Kohale's name. All these ballot papers were therefore treated as invalid, and the total number of invalid votes rose to 15,106. Had these voters written 1 instead of 2, Kohale could have received thousands more votes.

Questions are being raised over this. How and why did so many voters make the same mistake? Was it a deliberate plan by someone to sabotage the BJP and Kohale? Was it merely an accident, or did someone deliberately stab the party in the back? There is also talk that the Election Commission had not provided a NOTA option in this election, and that voters may have effectively turned their votes into NOTA by writing 2.

Ravi Waghmare, a senior Sangh volunteer and former BJP worker, was spoken to on the issue. He too expressed suspicion that so many voters invalidating their votes in the same manner was not an accident but a conspiracy. He suggested that senior BJP leaders look into it.

According to Waghmare, someone had deliberately arranged the invalid voting by writing 2 against Kohale's name. He said a vote does not begin without 1 being written on the ballot paper, and it is not considered valid. He said discerning voters who knew this did it deliberately. He also said that as there is no NOTA in this election, many voters cast a NOTA vote by writing 2 instead of 1. Waghmare said the party's senior leaders should think about why thousands of BJP voters did this.

Waghmare also spoke about independent candidate Nitesh Karale. According to him, Karale received first and second preference votes in large numbers in many localities where the BJP has influence, and the BJP leadership should introspect on this. Waghmare said Karale had no machinery behind him, yet how and from whom this young man got so many votes is a question worth pondering. He also said the votes Karale received showed that "Gen Z" cannot be ignored.

On the issue of caste, Waghmare said it is unfortunate that the graduates' election has turned to caste. According to him, the election had turned to caste during Sandip Joshi's time. Keeping that in mind, the BJP fielded Sudhakar Kohale of the Kunbi community this time so that the election would not go the caste way. Waghmare said this calculation of senior BJP leaders turned out to be completely wrong.