Mumbai: In South Mumbai's Byculla constituency, Congress' Madhu Chavan is taking on his namesake from BJP in the October 15 elections but both the candidates are not worried about the similarity in their names. This is not the first time that two Chavans are pitted against each other in this South Mumbai parliamentary constituency.
Byculla, once the den of now incarcerated underworld don Arun Gawli, is famous for Dagdi chawl, from where Gawli once ran his operations, Arthur Road Jail and also the Byculla zoo.
Sitting Congress MLA Madhu Chavan said he had contested against his namesake from BJP for the first time in 1999.
"There is no problem as I am called 'Anna' in my constituency. Even the ballot paper has my name as Anna alias Madhu Chavan while the BJP candidate is Madhukar Ganpat Chavan. In 1999, I defeated Janata Dal candidate and BJP's Madhu Chavan came third. In 2004, Arun Gawli defeated me," Chavan said.
BJP's Madhukar Chavan also said there would be no issues on similarity in names since their poll symbols are different and that his Congress counterpart was referred to as Anna.
"We have contested against each other in 1999," he said.
Apart from the two Chavans, the constituency will see Geeta Gawli, daughter of Gawli and a corporator, slugging it out as a nominee of Akhil Bhartiya Sena (ABS) on the support of Shiv Sena which has not fielded any candidate. ABS was founded by Gawli in 1997.
"In recent Lok Sabha elections, Milind Deora of Congress got a lead of 10,000 votes from her (Geeta's) ward," Congress' Chavan said.
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