Vandre East Assembly Election Results 2024: Uddhav Thackeray's nephew snatches win from Zeeshan Siddique with over 11,000 votes

Uddhav Thackeray's nephew and Shiv Sena (UBT) candidate Varun Sardesai won from the Vandre (Bandra) East seat with a margin of 11,365 votes, as per the Election Commission of India (ECI). He trounced Ajit Pawar-led NCP's Zeeshan Siddique and got 57,708 votes securing his victory.  

Zeeshan Siddique, son of slain former Maharashtra minister Baba Siddique, polled in 46,343 votes. Zeeshan's defeat showed that the sympathy factor from his father's untimely demise failed to make significant impact on the poll outcome. 

The Vandre East constituency is a part of the Mumbai North Central Lok Sabha constituency. In the 2019 Maharashtra Assembly elections, Zeeshan Siddique of the Congress won the seat by securing 38,337 votes.  

Zeeshan Siddique is son of Baba Siddique, who was killed this year by the Lawrence Bishnoi gang. Baba Siddique enjoyed much clout in suburban Bandra. 

Vandre (Bandra) East constituency is witnessing a triangular fight between sitting MLA Zeeshan Siddique of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), who won on a Congress ticket in 2019, and Uddhav Thackeray’s nephew Varun Sardesai. Trupti Sawant of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), a former Shiv Sena MLA from the constituency, is also vying for the seat. 

The constituency faces several issues, including slum redevelopment, poor condition of roads, access to railway stations, safety of pedestrians, traffic congestion due to Metro and other infrastructure works, clean drinking water supply among others. 

Shiv Sena’s Prakash (Bala) Sawant won the seat in the 2009 and 2014 elections. After his death, his wife Trupti Sawant defeated the then Congress leader and former chief minister Narayan Rane in the bypolls with a significant margin. Rane is now a BJP MP. 

The recent Lok Sabha elections saw Mahayuti trailing in the seat with Congress’s Mumbai unit chief Varsha Gaikwad taking a lead of 27,462 votes against BJP’s Ujjwal Nikam.