Day of reckoning for Vasai’s ‘strongman’ Hitendra Thakur?

Even though the BVA won 106 of the 115 seats in the VVCMC in the 2015 civic polls and the BJP only one, the latter is emboldened by last year’s assembly win in Vasai-Virar. By defeating Thakur, the party has managed to create the perception among citizens that “Appa” is no longer invincible

MUMBAI: On November 19, a day before Maharashtra’s assembly elections last year, two seemingly routine incidents signalled a possible shift in power equations in the Vasai-Virar region.

Day of reckoning for Vasai’s ‘strongman’ Hitendra Thakur?

Hitendra Thakur and his son Kshitij, MLAs from Vasai and Nallasopara representing the Bahujan Vikas Aghadi (BVA), claimed to have caught BJP national general-secretary Vinod Tawde in a cash-for-votes trap. Producing envelopes with currency notes allegedly found in a bag Tawde was carrying, the Thakurs hoped to gain an advantage in the high-stakes contest. But the BJP struck back, scoring a victory by poaching BVA’s Dahanu candidate, Suresh Padvi, narrowing the competition for the BJP candidate.

Political observers saw more than theatrics in these twin incidents. They mirrored a bitter reality about to unfold – the unseating of Hitendra Thakur, ‘Vasai strongman’ and six-time MLA, whose writ had run for more than three decades in the region just north of Mumbai. His son Kshitij too, a three-time MLA, lost his seat in the election, most significantly, both falling to BJP candidates.

Plans for these buildings had been cleared by the BVA-led VVCMC. Not surprisingly, the Agarwal Nagar case is being held up as an example of what happens when planners and civic officials align with developers in a region with diminished political and administrative oversight.

In the same case, the ED also arrested two senior civic officials – Anil Pawar a day after he was transferred from the post of VVMC commissioner, and deputy town planner YS Reddy.

The BJP-led Mahayuti government’s sweep didn’t stop there. It also appointed a high-level committee to investigate alleged irregularities in a solid waste management project at the Gokhivare dumping ground. The panel found ₹24 crore had been spent wastefully, implying massive irregularities in the project.

“With the Thakur camp having held sway over the VVCMC for 35 years, the state government’s actions are being read as an attempt to push them and their supporters in the administration onto the backfoot,” said Vasai resident and former journalist John Colaco. “With the ED in action in Vasai-Virar, and a probe into the Gokhivare project, the message is very clear: the BJP will use this opportunity to establish its control over the VVCMC.”

A Canny Strategist

For 63-year-old Hitendra Thakur, whose authority was until recently unchallenged in Vasai-Virar, these developments are deeply unsettling. He was only 29 when he won his first election as an MLA on a Congress ticket in 1990. While his brother Bhai Thakur allegedly relied on criminal means to build the family’s clout, Hitendra turned to politics to tighten the family’s grip on the region.

For the Thakurs’, the timing was perfect. The early 1990s saw an upswing in construction activity in Vasai-Virar, which rose as a dormitory town, providing cheap housing to those who couldn’t afford Mumbai’s prohibitive real estate prices but who worked in the metropolis. Besides their alleged nexus with builders, the Thakurs also controlled the area’s water supply – the lifeline of residents and builders, whose affordable housing projects had begun to dot the region.

The tanker lobby started drawing water from wells in old Vasai’s green belt, triggering protests among residents under the Harit Vasai Saurakshan Samiti (HVSS). They began to raise their voice against illegal constructions and protest the Thakurs’ unbridled political power. Yet Thakur, who fought the elections as an independent candidate, emerged victorious in the 1995 polls.

The Thakurs own large land parcels in the area as well as the Viva group of companies with diversified interests including a college. To ensure his continued dominance in the region, Thakur deployed a shrewd strategy – he backed whichever party held power in the state, regardless of ideology. He positioned himself as a crucial ally when the government needed to prove its majority in the assembly. It was a quid pro quo that earned him rich rewards.

“This was the dawn of the era of coalition politics in the central and state governments, and the Thakur camp, which controlled three to four MLAs in Vasai-Virar, was a key ally for various regimes,” said Colaco.

The Thakur camp also played a key role in Lok Sabha elections. “So, whether it was a Congress-NCP government or BJP-Shiv Sena government till 2024, everyone enjoyed a favourable equation with the Thakur camp,” said Colaco.

A changing Vasai-Virar

In the last 15 years, the galloping population of Vasai-Virar has accelerated the demand for affordable housing. Of all the municipal corporations in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region, VVCMC saw the fastest population growth – from around 4 lakh in 1991 to 12 lakh, according to the 2011 census. According to current estimates, the number has crossed 20 lakh, thanks to an influx of migrants from all over the country, especially North India.

Anirudh Paul, professor at the Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture and Environmental Studies at in Mumbai, and a long-time resident of Vasai, recalled that in the early 2000s, builders sensed a golden opportunity and began to buy small pieces of tribal land, especially in Vasai-Virar east. Flourishing under political patronage in a civic body ruled by Thakur’s BVA, they were granted permission to build roads and other amenities, to enhance the viability of their projects.

“More than 70% of Vasai, Nallasopara and Virar east was either forest, tribal land or a green zone. Over the years, illegal buildings have been built on these lands as civic officials colluded with builders and the local land mafia,” said Paul.

Political patronage fuelled unauthorised constructions across the board, many projects lacking the mandatory Occupancy Certificate (OC) needed to sell the apartments. From 2021 to 2025, the VVCMC served notices to more than 1,150 builders and contractors under the Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning Act (MRTP) 1966. Of these, 391 cases have been converted into FIRs but it hasn’t slowed the tide of corruption.

“For one, builders are arrested but released on bail, and second, demolitions cannot take place unless there is a court order,” said Sanjay Herwade, additional municipal commissioner, VVCMC. Adds Paul, “Corrupt civic officials made sure these developers were not issued OCs, so that they could later wash their hands of these unauthorised constructions.”

The land and builder mafia’s nexus with corrupt civic officials has seen forest lands being encroached, salt pans reclaimed, and farm lands turned into townships with inadequate infrastructure and drainage causing frequent floods in the monsoon, says Ravi Bhushan, social activist of the Congress party.

Why BJP is making inroads

The boom years may have fortified Thakur’s fiefdom, but the very forces that propelled his rise as the region’s strongman now threaten to unseat him. A BJP leader said unauthorised constructions in VVCMC met the demand for low-cost housing, attracting individuals from North India, predominantly from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand. Today, these migrants constitute 25% of the population in VVCMC’s limits. Alongside the Gujarati-Rajasthani community, the trader community has also swelled to more than 10% of the population.

This change in demography, said the leader, has helped the BJP make inroads into Thakur’s stronghold. “Conventionally, North Indians and Gujarati-Rajasthanis voted for the BJP in the Lok Sabha polls but backed the Thakur camp in assembly and civic elections. The 2024 state elections, however, saw their votes swing to the BJP, giving the party not only the two crucial Thakur seats but also a fillip ahead of the civic elections,” he said.

Manoj Patil, BJP leader from VVCMC, attributed the shift to the BVA’s poor performance, which eroded faith in the Thakur brand. This anti-incumbency shift worked squarely in the BJP’s favour during last year’s assembly elections.

“There is a strong sentiment among Vasai-Virar citizens that the region has stayed backward in transport, roads, health care facilities, etc, compared to other municipal corporations in the MMR,” said Patil. “Hence, when our party won both assembly seats in the VVCMC area, it was clear that people had voted for change.”

Time for political change?

With only months to go before the VVCMC polls, the BJP and Shiv Sena, allies in the Mahayuti government, are playing the development card and stepping up outreach to erode the Thakur camp’s base. The BJP has tasked minister Ganesh Naik with mobilising local communities. Last month, Naik – an Agri leader from the MMR, regarded as a son of the soil – held meetings with groups including the Agris, Kolis and Mangelas.

“Typically, local communities like the Vadval and Samvedi in the Palghar region have stood by Hitendra Thakur. Now the BJP is assuring these communities of government and political support,” said a local BJP leader.

He said state BJP president Ravindra Chavan is keeping a close eye on organisational programmes and political activities here, and working to change local equations by inducting prominent names from the BVA or old friends of Thakur into the BJP.

As part of the party’s public outreach, BJP MP Hemant Savara recently met professionals like doctors, chartered accountants, architects and businessmen to discuss issues that concern them.

MLA Sneha Dube-Pandit, who defeated Thakur by a narrow margin of 3,153 votes in 2024, said, “Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis will be the face of development for the VVCMC elections. The state government has started taking several decisions for the development of Vasai and Virar, including four railway over-bridges at Virar, Nallasopara and Vasai. Then there’s the Virar-Borivali sixth line, and the proposed Vasai-Borivali-Panvel train route that will allow middle-class professionals to travel to Navi Mumbai easily,” she said.

Meanwhile, Thakur is scrambling to retain his base. According to political activists in the VVCMC, he may forge poll alliances with the Congress and Shiv Sena (UBT) to avoid a division of votes that cost him dear in the assembly elections.

Through it all, Thakur is wearing a brave face. “Whatever happened in the assembly elections is in the past. As of now, we have decided to fight the civic elections on our own,” he said.

He blamed the lack of municipal elections due to the Covid pandemic on the sorry state of infrastructure and civic amenities. “People are struggling to resolve their local problems in the absence of corporators. Every day, they come to me with complaints regarding the civic administration,” said Thakur.

For the “king of Vasai”, the clock may be running out and there’s little he can do to stop it. Pratap Asbe, senior journalist, pointed out that to consolidate power, Thakur united all the local communities like the Vadvals, Agris and Kolis, to form the BVA at a time when the North Indian population was growing in the Vasai-Virar region in the 1990s.

Added Asbe, “In doing so, Thakur styled himself as a champion of the local communities, playing the sons-of-the-soil card. But with changing demographics and his monumental loss in the assembly elections, the BJP will try to dethrone him in the VVMC elections.”

Mira-Bhayandar: A Twin Challenge

Just like in Vasai-Virar, the neighbouring twin suburbs of Mira-Bhayander also have a large number of unauthorised constructions. S Muzaffar Hussain, former Congress MLC, traces the origin of this trend to the Urban Land (Ceiling and Regulation) Act, 1976.

“When the Act came into being, landowners, who were predominantly farmers, did not have clarity about the new law and feared losing their holdings. This is when unauthorised buildings with three to four floors mushroomed in the mid-1980s,” said Hussain.

Activist and advocate Krishna Gupta is fighting an uphill battle to get a list of unauthorised structures listed on the MBMC’s portal. “I have sent 37 reminders to MBMC commissioners and other officials,” Gupta said. “There is a government resolution directing civic bodies to mandatorily make such disclosures, yet only a fraction are made public.”

A project making news is 20-year-old Ostwal Paradise Society, comprising six buildings riddled with illegalities. On August 30, Umraosingh Ostwal, director of Shree Ostwal Builders, was arrested for allegedly creating fake construction permits and maps of Mira Road’s Ostwal Paradise Building No 6.

“The permit was only till the 4th floor, but the developer constructed seven storeys. He also forged the plans of buildings 4, 5 and 6 and sold flats,” alleged a resident. “He also tampered with documents and permissions in the construction of building No 7.”

It appears the developer blamed his now deceased architect. But the police secured a letter where the architect in 2009 had brought the illegality to the notice of the authorities, and the police nailed the developer, the resident said.

While Umraosingh Ostwal was arrested last month, home owners are paying the price. The Mira-Bhayander Municipal Corporation (MBMC), in April 2024, ordered a survey of the buildings, putting a question mark on their apartments.

Another similar case is being handled by the MBMC, on the directions of the Bombay High Court, against Ravi Developers. The complaint, lodged in July, claims as many as 14 projects of the developers are unauthorised, even though the apartments are occupied and many are still being sold.