In eight seats, VBA polled more votes than winning margins

The Vanchit Bahujan Agadhi (VBA) of Dalit leader Prakash Ambedkar and AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi may have damaged the prospects of Congress-NCP alliance in eight Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra, the victory margins of Shiv Sena-BJP candidates show.

The saffron alliance won 41 of the 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra. The Congress won one, the NCP won four.

The VBA, which contested all 48 seats in the state after alliance talks with the Congress failed, is likely to have eaten into Congress-NCP votes in many places.

In eight seats -- Akola, Buldhana, Gadchiroli-Chimur, Hatkanangle, Nanded, Parbhani, Sangli and Solapur -- victory margins of BJP-Sena candidates were lower than the votes polled by VBA candidates.

In Hingoli, Latur, Yavatmal-Washim, Beed and Nashik, the contest could have been very close had the VBA not been in the fray.

AIMIM's Imitiaz Jaleel, a journalist-turned-MLA, won from Aurangabad, defeating Shiv Sena's Chandrakant Khaire. But elsewhere the VBA lost. Ambedkar contested from Akola and Solapur and lost from both constituencies.

In Akola, he polled 2,78,848 votes; the victory margin of the winning candidate, BJP's Sanjay Dhotre, was 2,75,596.

In Beed, the VBA got 92,139 votes, possibly cutting into votes of NCP candidate who lost to BJP's Pritam Munde.

In Buldhana, the VBA candidate got 1,72,627 votes, possibly resulting in the NCP's loss. The victory margin of the winning Shiv Sena candidate there was 1,33,287 votes.

In Gadchiroli-Chimur, VBA polled 1,11,468 votes. Winning margin of the BJP candidate was 77,526 votes.

In Hatkanagale, VBA got 1,23,419 votes, while sitting MP Raju Shetti, who had aligned with the Congress, lost by 96,039 votes.

In Hingoli, the VBA got 1,74,051 votes; the Congress candidate lost by 2,77,856 votes.

In Latur, VBA vote share was 1,12,255, while the Congress candidate lost by 2,89,111 votes.

The biggest setback for the Congress was in Nanded and Solapur, where two of its former chief minister lost.

In Nanded, VBA got 1,66,196 votes, while state Congress president and sitting MP Ashok Chavan lost by around 40,000 votes.

In Solapur, Prakash Ambedkar polled 1,70,007 votes while Sushilkumar Shinde of the Congress lost to the BJP candidate by 1,58,08 votes.

In Yavatmal, where the VBA polled 94,228 votes, former state Congress chief Manikrao Thakre lost by 1,17,939 votes.

In Sangli, the VBA got 3,00,234 votes (the highest it got in the state). Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghtana candidate Vishal Patil, an ally of the Congress, lost by 1,64,352 votes in Sangli to his BJP rival.

In Parbhani, the VBA got 1,49,946 votes, where the NCP canidate lost by a margin of 42,199 votes.

In 15 other constituencies, VBA polled over 50,000 votes.

BJP president Raosaheb Danve said the BJP had nothing to do with the VBA contesting all the seats. "We were doing our campaigning," he said.

But Shinde, former Union home minister, said while commenting on his defeat from Solapur that "VBA should introspect about on whose side is it.