'David' Bangade vs 'Goliath' Ahir in Chanda contest

Chandrapur: A turf of virtually a no-contest, at least on paper, was created in the Chandrapur parliamentary constituency after Congress sprang a surprise while naming former district president Vinayak Bangade (66) as their candidate. The contest seems lopsided as Bangade is set to take on the BJP’s four-time MP and current minister Hansraj Ahir.

The low-profile scooter-riding Bangade runs a small-scale industry and doesn’t even hold a prominent party post. Many Congress bigwigs were vying for the ticket.

Bangade’s nomination was described as a victory for Congress’s ‘samanya karyakarta’ (common worker) by one of his party colleagues Deepak Dixit who had seen him from close quarters for several years. “He has a clean and non-controversial image. Bangade has been with the Congress from his student days. The party has honoured the common man by nominating Bangade,” he said.

Bangade’s last foray in election was during the 1999 state elections. He had then lost to current state finance minister Sudhir Mungantiwar by more than 30,00 votes. In the 2004 elections, he was replaced by Gajanan Gawande who too lost to Mungantiwar.

Bangade faces a daunting task. In 2014, Ahir won by more than 2.36 lakh votes over Sanjay Deotale of the Congress. Party workers say the victory was a result of the “Modi wave” and it is “non-existent now”.

Known as former MP Naresh Pugaliya’s close aide, Bangade switched to the Vijay Wadettiwar camp after a tiff with his former mentor during the municipal election in 2012 when his aide was denied a ticket.

There were rumours that Warora’s sitting MLA Balu Dhanorkar of Shiv Sena would contest against Ahir on a Congress ticket. Dhanorkar had the support of a Congress leader who had started lobbying in Delhi too.

Bangade said his chances of becoming a giant killer was bright as Ahir had failed to keep promises. “The district remained poor in development index, unemployment frustrated the youth and traders suffered deadly blows in demonetization and GST. There is an underlying rage against Ahir. Whatever industrial development had happened, had taken place when Congress was in power,” he said.

It remains to be seen if Bangade has the support of Wadettiwar, Pugaliya and Rajura MLA Subhas Dhote.