Thread by @MandarSawant184

Well as we speak sitting in August 2020, we are just 18 odd months away from the mega urban local body election easy in Maharashtra. Almost all big urban bodies have local elections in February 2022 including the Brihanmumbai Mahanagar Palika (BMC)

The last election in 2017 was pretty dramatic. BMC won almost all the local bodies including Pune, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Nagpur and Nashik municiplaities. The Sena somehow saved their face in their traditional forts of Mumbai and Thane.

The Sena looked like cruising to a huge victory in the BMC but by the late afternoon the BJP crafted a magnificant comeback and ended up winning 82 seats (its previous best 38 of course in alliance with the Sena unlike 2017). The Sena could garner just 84 seats and cling to power

The Sena then broke the MNS and got independent corporators to join the party to swell their number to 90+, which is well short of the majority mark of 114.
Much water has flown under the bridge since then but we will be seeing a new combination in 2022, BJP vs the MVA allies

The biggest factor behind the BJP's success were the western suburbs of Mumbai, from Dahisar to Bandra. This region has 99/227 wards in the city. The 2017 seat results in this area is as follows,
BJP - 47
Sena - 32
Cong - 15
NCP - 2
AIMIM - 2
Independents - 2
NCP - 1

To get to a majority of it's own BJP needs to win 32 additional wards (114 - 82). BJP can easily add 13 seats to its tally in these Western and Northern suburbs of Mumbai and reach a count of 60. Of course they face a formidable opponent in the form of the MVA (mainly Sena+ Cong)

That leaves BJP with the task to get 54/128 seats in the remaining areas of Mumbai viz. Eastern suburbs and South-Central Mumbai. This is not an easy task as Sena's strength lies in this area

BJP stood second in 28 seats in this belt. 20 of these seats were lost by a margin of less than 3000 votes. Not exactly very small margin in an electoral ward (of approx 54,000 voters each). BJP can easily win 13-15 seats more. But Cong+Sena arithmetic on paper can be deadly

Some factors that will be key,
1. The arithmetic of Cong+Sena esp in minority dominated areas and poor neighborhoods that usually elect Cong or Sena. But Sena supporting voters hate Congress to the core. Whether they will vote for the Congress candidate is a big if

2. MNS could emerge as a big player. MNS has zero seats in Western plus Northern belt plus only one runner up position in 2017. But now the section of sena voters who hate both BJP and Congress, could support MNS.
3. Hindutva voters would go with BJP

4. The good infra work done by BJP esp in areas from Dahisar to Bandra will help BJP. Thats the reason BJP started two metro routes in these areas.
5. Hindus no longer vote Congress. So this could spook the Sena voters.

6. If Sena is able to maintain core vote and add muslim vote, it will help them a lot. But Cong will demand atleast 25/99 seats in this region. One more seat to the Congress is a loss to the Sena
7. Anger on COVID handling against the Sena (state govt and BMC level) could hurt

8. Irrespective of COVID, there is a feeling among neutrals voters that Sena has been given 25 years plus at the head of the BMC. Now with a worthy alternative in form of the BJP, the Sena could be hit hard.

Which of the factors play a bigger role will decide who rules the BMC