The Sena (UBT), an ally of the Congress and NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar), has reposed faith in the tried and tested Chandrakant Khaire, a four-time MP who lost to the AIMIM’s Imtiaz Jaleel in 2019 by just 4,492 votes. The Shinde Sena has fielded Cabinet minister Sandipanrao Bhumre, an MLA from Paithan, which falls in the neighbouring Jalna district.

In between serving customers, Sujata Birad, who runs a food stall outside Aurangabad airport, hits the nail on the head. “Everyone is confused. There are so many parties and candidates, and no guarantee who will remain with whom later.”

Gajanan Landge, who is eating bread pakora at the stall and works with an airline, points to another truism of this election in Marathwada. “A lot will depend on which way the Marathas and OBCs vote.” Landge himself is a Maratha.

The Maratha reservation protests, the state government’s concession to them, and the OBC fears about losing their share of the quota benefits have driven a rift between the two communities, which is expected to be a key issue in the Marathwada region.

But if for the AIMIM it’s a prestige fight given that the Aurangabad seat was one of its first electoral wins outside Hyderabad, for the two Senas too, a lot is at stake. It is the first electoral test of the respective factions after the split, in an area that was the first outside Mumbai that Bal Thackeray planted his feet in, in the early 1990s.

Aurangabad Lok Sabha seat

Shinde Sena candidate Bhumre starts out with the disadvantage that he is seen as an “outsider”, for “not being from Aurangabad”. Plus, the Sena workers or Sainiks on the ground are believed to be with Uddhav Thackeray here, as in other parts of the state. The Sena (UBT) chief has their sympathy for Shinde splitting the party founded by Uddhav’s father Bal Thackeray and walking away with 40 of the Sena’s 56 MLAs and 13 of its 19 MPs.

That the split is seen as having been engineered by the BJP is not helping the Shinde Sena.

Many people, including those who do not like the Sena (UBT)’s Khaire, say the same: “In Aurangabad, there is only the ‘Bal Thackeray Shiv Sena’. We don’t recognise the other (Shinde Sena).”

From “gaddar (traitor)” to “khoke sarkar (a government resting on money power)”, the Sena (UBT) has rolled out a campaign to discredit the Shinde Sena.

Khaire is promising that he will bring big industries and generate employment if he wins, and raising issues such as water shortage, a major concern in most parts of the drought-prone Marathwada.

Mindful of Aurangabad’s significance, Chief Minister Eknath Shinde fought long and hard to get the seat in its talks with the BJP. And has now put his weight behind Bhumre, addressing a rally here on the day he filed his nomination. Shinde also visited Maratha leader Vinod Patil to elicit support for Bhumre, in a bid to assuage the Maratha anger with his government over the reservation issue.

Patil incidentally had been keen on getting the Mahayuti’s ticket for the Aurangabad Lok Sabha seat.

Of the six Assembly segments which fall under the Aurangabad seat, all are currently with the Shinde Sena and BJP, barring Kannad which is with the Sena (UBT). Shinde is banking on this ground support, apart from “this election being all about PM Narendra Modi”.

Samad Patel, who heads a stamp registration office in Sambhajinagar, says: “The fight between the two Senas will divide the votes between Khaire and Bhumre. This may help the AIMIM.”

That would also be the Sena (UBT)’s fear because, unlike the rest of Maharashtra where Muslims are seen as voting for the MVA en bloc, here the AIMIM is a strong contender for the community’s vote; Muslims are in a majority in the constituency.

The AIMIM is additionally trying hard to retain the support of the Dalit and backward segments within OBCs that it got last time on account of its alliance with the Vikas Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) of Prakash Ambedkar. The two parties are contesting separately, with the VBA’s plans for a tie-up with the MVA also falling through.

Vishwajeet Maske, who works for a private firm at the city’s Kranti Chowk, says he fears that the vote will ultimately come down to sectarian lines. “We have lived with the water crisis for decades, graduates and postgraduates are idling with no work. Yet, when it comes to voting, people turn to their caste and community,” he says.

There is a realisation of the impact it has had on Aurangabad, where tension between the Hindu and Muslim communities lies just below the surface. A year ago, people from the two communities clashed after Hindutva groups driving past the Ram temple raising slogans in Muslim-dominated Kiradpura area hit a passerby.

Jagdish Patil proudly talks about “the larger scale of the Hanuman Jayanti celebrations this year (on April 23)”.

Arslan Khan, 19, who helps out at the family-owned paan shop outside the AIMIM head office, and will be voting for the first time, says he doesn’t think much about these things. “I will go by what my family and elders suggest.”

Afroze Jaleel says this suits the politicians fine, as they have no answer to inflation and unemployment. “Dange fasad se kisi ka kya bhala hua hai kabhi (Has any ordinary person ever gained from a riot)?”