Lottery for mayor reservations by government’s Urban development department concluded for all 29 municipalities
A woman corporator from the general category will lead the BMC as mayor.
BJP and ally Shiv Sena Shinde faction locked in a tussle over mayor post
Reservations for the mayor’s post of the BMC concluded with an announcement of a general quota for women through lottery. The much-awaited reservation lottery was carried out by Madhuri Misal, minister for state for urban development on January 22, at the state secretariat. Lottery was also carried out for the mayor posts of all 29 municipal corporations across Maharashtra.
After the mayor's post being reserved for female open quota for the BMC, Shiv sena UBT leader and former mayor of Mumbai Kishori Pednekar raised objections.
“The last two mayors of Mumbai were from the general category, this time OBC and ST categories should have been added during the lottery, but that didn’t happen. This is injustice to the ST community, therefore we raised objections,” Pedenekar told the media.
Pednekar and other Shiv sena (UBT) leaders alleged that the lottery process was carried out according to the elected mandate to the political parties.
However, while addressing the media, Misal denied any foul play in the lottery system and stated the process was transparently carried out according to the rules and with transparency.
Along with the BMC, Pune, Navi Mumbai and Mira Bhayandar corporations will also be headed by women mayors from the general category. The adjoining municipal corporation of Thane will have a mayor from SC (Scheduled caste) general category and Kalyan Dombivli municipal corporation (KDMC) will have a mayor from ST general category.
After the declaration of the lottery, political parties are now set to nominate their candidates for corporators from the respective reservation categories. The BJP can nominate Tejaswi Ghosalkar as a surprise candidate for the BMC mayor post from the female open reservation category, according to sources.
Ghosalkar, a corporator from Dahisar, switched from Shiv sena (UBT) to the BJP weeks before the BMC election. Her husband Abhishek Ghosalkar was shot dead in 2024 at his office in Dahisar. The CBI is investigating the Ghosalkar murder case.
Political tensions rose in Mumbai during the election campaign over the mayoral post. The BJP pitched for a Hindu mayor, taking a jibe at Zohran Mamdani winning the mayoral post in New York. As electoral campaigns intensified in the last few weeks before the BMC elections, Opposition parties -- Shiv sena (UBT) and MNS -- pitched for a Marathi mayor after the verdict. During the campaign, the BJP including chief minister Fadnavis, had declared that the Mahayuti will nominate a Hindu-Marathi mayor.
Now BJP is left with fewer options to nominate a ‘Hindu-Marathi’ mayor from the women general category. Corporators like Sangeeta Sharma, Leena Patel- Deharekar will be out of competition for ‘Hindu-Marathi’ mayor.
The BJP won 89 seats out of 227 for the BMC, Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena won 29 seats. However, Shinde tried to bargain for power sharing with his emotional pitch that the mayoral post should be shared with his party as a tribute to Balasaheb Thackeray in his centenary year that begins in January 2026.
