MUMBAI, February 15: India's smallest Lok Sabha constituency is also its wealthiest. That's not the only paradox in the South Mumbai constituency of 7 lakh voters, where Malabar Hill's skyscrapers vie with Colaba's bustling shanty towns.This time around, the fight for this constituency promises to be the most closely fought one in the city. Problems ranging from dilapidated buildings, poor infrastructure and pollution have taken a back seat in this pumphouse of the city's economy, which is witnessing a slugfest between sitting BJP MP Jaywantiben Mehta and Congress candidate Murli Deora.In 1996, Mehta polled 1.35 lakh votes to defeat sitting MP Deora by a margin of 23,000 votes. The damage was done by former Congressman and SP candidate Marazban Patrawala, who rode away with 48,000 votes. The joke doing the rounds is that the much bandied Congress-Samajwadi Party tie up in the state is for this one seat. ``Tenants,'' smiles Deora, when quizzed about his issue this election. Deora campaigns with theswagger of someone who has scented victory, thanks to his campaign on the Rent Act. Nearly 80 per cent of South Mumbai's electorate are tenants.Anil Goenka, chairperson of the Old Building Co-operative Housing Societies, says the Act has become a big issue in South Mumbai only because Deora understands it well. ``He's been with the tenant since 1986,'' he says.Deora's campaign for this hotseat may have begun last November, when he leapt on to the Rent Act bandwagon on behalf of the thousands of tenants who would be evicted or pay monstrous rents, he claimed.The truth may lie somewhere in between, but for the moment, Deora's histrionics have put the state government on the defensive. ``Can you imagine someone like Bal Thackeray, who addresses huge rallies at Shivaji Park, has been forced to address street corner meetings in Thakurdwar?'' he tells tenants, referring to Thackeray's meet last week.Later, walking through rows of buildings, Deora showers allegations that the BJP is in cahoots with thelandlords. He would, naturally, take up the tenants' cause in Parliament. ``I'll get the tenants-ownership scheme cleared by the Supreme Court,'' he thunders to hutment dwellers at Chikalwadi. In sharp contrast, Jaywantiben Mehta's campaign focuses on her party's national agenda, stability, and of course, roots for Vajpayee as PM.``Andhere mein ek chingaari, Atal Behari, Atal Behari'' chorus a phalanx of women leading her rath through Kamatipura. She terms Deora's campaign as a political stunt. ``They have no issue in this election, so the Act is being used to fool people,'' says Mehta, who reels off a list of public amenities like ticket windows, drinking water and toilets she has constructed with her MP fund.A volunteer distributing pamphlets in Hindi deftly switches over to Urdu handbills when he sees bystanders wearing skullcaps. Mehta's supporters claim that her rath has been through hitherto uncharted territory, specifically the Muslim dominated areas in Nagpada and Bhendi Bazaar.However, itremains to be seen if this can translate into votes, for it is arguably in this constituency, more than anywhere else in the state, that the SP's alliance with the Congress could have the most devastating effect.There are nearly 1.50 lakh Muslim voters in this constituency who could upset applecarts. ``We voted SP last time to teach the Congress a lesson for betraying Muslims on Babri," says Mohammed Shakeel, who will now vote Congress only because it is allied with SP. Abdul Rahman, a resident of Tulsiwadi, complains that the state government doesn't seem keen about fulfilling its Slum Redevelopment Scheme (SRD).
