Nagpur Graduates’ Constituency, BJP’s historical stronghold
   Date :22-Nov-2020

Nagpur Graduates_1 &
 
 
 
By Vikas Vaidya :
 
With just 10 days remaining for the Nagpur Graduates’ polls, campaigning has gained momentum. The constituency, with its interesting history, also provides a wonderful peep into the political ups and downs of the region and fortunes of many stalwarts. Since the time it came to be known as Vidarbha Padvidhar, it has remained a stronghold of erstwhile Bharatiya Jansangh or the present Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The elections for the constituency were first held in 1958 and stalwarts like Bachhraj Vyas, Shridhar Sohoni, Vishnu Deshpande, Ramjivan Chaudhary, Dr Pramila Tople, Gangadharrao Fadnavis, Nitin Gadkari and Prof Anil Sole came out as winners.
 
Till 1989, the constituency was known as Vidarbha Padvidhar constituency with three seats. Congress, too, won seat twice - by Prahlad Khode and Govind Athawale. As per records, the first election was held in 1958. The three candidates who won were Bachharaj Vyas of Bharatiya Jansangh, Vishwanath Subhedar of Samajwadi P and Prahlad Khode of Congress. Vyas remained on the seat till 1972. A prominent non-BJP leader who won the election was B T Deshmukh of NUTA. He won the election in 1980 and remained an MLC till 1986. Meanwhile, Amravati University came into existence in 1983, yet the constituency remained the same. After 1983, the ‘Vidarbha Padvidhar’ was divided into two separate constituencies - Nagpur and Amravati Graduates’ Constituencies.
 
Then, B T Deshmukh started contesting the elections from Amravati. In 1980 along with B T Deshmukh, Dr Motiram Lahane, contesting on the BJP ticket, won the election. Earlier in 1962, Shridhar Anant Sohoni, a candidate of Jansangh had this seat followed by Vishnu Deshpande who remained victorious till 1968. Deshpande, too, had contested as Jansangh candidate. The first candidate who contested the Vidarbha Padvidhar constituency polls on BJP ticket was Ramjivan Chaudhari. He won the elections twice, in 1968 and 1974. In 1978 Gangadharrao Fadnavis, father of former Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis contested and won the seat. He remained MLC till 1988.
 
In 1989, the Graduate and Teachers’ constituency became separate and BJP gave ticket of Graduates constituency to Nitin Jairam Gadkari. Gadkari kept winning the seat till 2008. He won elections of this constituency five times in a row and with solid margins. In 2014, Gadkari moved to Lok Sabha, paving way for Prof Anil Sole, the former Mayor to become BJP candidate. Sole too won the elections. This time the fight is on cards between Sandip Joshi, candidate of BJP, Bahujan Republican Ekta Manch, Republican Party of India (Athawale) and Adv Abhijit Wanjari of Mahavikas Aaghadi, RPI (Kawade).