Maximum City, Maximum Hopes

Having put the Mumbai Congress in order, Milind Deora hopes the results will show

- Rachna Tyagi & Dnyanesh Jathar

WHEN MUKESH AMBANI and Uday Kotak endorsed Mumbai Congress president Milind Deora’s candidature from Mumbai South, it was an unprecedented achievement in Indian politics. Never before has an industrialist of Ambani’s stature or a banking baron like Kotak publicly endorsed a politician in Maharashtra.

The effects, obviously, will be both good and bad for Deora. On the one hand, the former Union minister and two-term MP from Mumbai South will be viewed as someone who understands the problems of businessmen, industrialists and traders, while on the other, there is a risk that he could be branded as an ‘Ambani man’ and the voice of the city’s elite. But, few know the problems faced by the city’s poor like Deora does. He and his father, Murli Deora, have won from this seat six times between themselves for the Congress. Shiv Sena’s Arvind Sawant beat Deora in 2014, and the two locked horns once again this time, when all six seats in Mumbai went to the polls on April 29.

Recently appointed as president of Mumbai Congress, Deora, 42, is shouldering the responsibility with much enthusiasm. When he took over the reins, a clear message was conveyed to all the factions within the party that internal issues could be handled later; first, make party candidates win from Mumbai.