Mah polls: Wadettiwar, Dr Nitin Raut, Sunil Kedar figure in Cong’s first list

Pratibha Dhanorkar, wife of Suresh Dhanorkar, the lone MP of Congress from State, got ticket of Warora Yashomati Thakur (Teosa), Ranjit Kamble (Deoli), Virendra Jagtap (Dhamangaon Railway) also figure in the list

Congress released its first list of 51 candidates for the Maharashtra Assembly elections, on Sunday. From Vidarbha, prominent names that figured in the list included Sunil Kedar, sitting MLA from Saoner; Vijay Wadettiwar, Leader of Opposition in State Assembly from Brahmapuri; Dr Nitin Raut from North Nagpur (SC). Suresh Dhanorkar, the lone MP from Congress in Maharashtra succeeded in getting ticket for his wife Pratibha. She will be contesting from Warora constituency.

Mukul Wasnik, General Secretary of All India Congress Committee (AICC) and in-charge of Central Election Committee (CEC) released the list. The other names included Adv Yashomati Thakur (Teosa), Ranjeet Kamble (Deoli), Amar Kale (Arvi), Harshvardhan Sapkal (Buldhana), Anant Wankhede (Mehkar - SC), Satish Warjukar (Chimur), Anil Mangrulkar (Yavatmal), Amit Zanak (Risod). Vijay Wadettiwar has been winning elections from last three terms. Two terms he contested from Chimur while last election he was fielded from Brahmapuri and won election by over 13,000 votes. Lot of speculations were doing rounds about the candidature of Dr Nitin Raut as some corporators had opposed his name. But Dr Raut did not react and remained silent.

Being Working President of Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee, he was constantly on the state tour. In the list that was declared on Sunday, his name figured for Nagpur North (SC) constituency. Sunil Kedar, a five time MLA of Saoner got ticket of his Saoner constituency. It was sheer luck that despite having Modi wave, Kedar got elected as Sonba Musale of Bhartiya Janata Party committed mistake in the affidavit and his candidature was cancelled. Had Musale contested, the picture would have been different. This time BJP is likely to field Dr Rajiv Potdar, its Nagpur District President. Suresh Dhanorkar who was originally in Shiv Sena got shifted to Congress and contested Lok Sabha elections this year from Chandrapur. Shockingly he defeated Hansraj Ahir and stopped the clean sweep by BJP in Maharashtra. With being the only Congress member in Lok Sabha in State, Dhanorkar used his weight and fetched ticket of Warora assembly constituency for his wife Pratibha.

Amit Zanak is carrying the legacy of his father Subhash Zanak who was elected as member of Maharashtra Legislative Assembly from Risod, in Washim district in October 2009. He was elected from Medshi in 1985, 1990 and 1995. Subhash Zanak too had his godfather at home. His father Ramrao Zanak, got elected as MLA from Medshi in 1980. Amit Zanak won first election in 2014 from Risod by defeating BJP MLA Vijay Jadhav. Ranjeet Kamble, a nephew of former State Women Congress Chief Prabha Rao has been winning elections for the last three terms. He will contest from Deoli-Pulgaon constituency. Adv Yashomati Thakur of Teosa is a stalwart leader of Congress in Vidarbha. She is the only woman MLA from this region. She is among top leaders in State.