The city witnesses polling to elect its six MPs

The city goes to polls for its six seats today. Mumbaikars being lazy voters, the polling was slow in the morning as expected, which went brisk as the day advanced.

Besides the city’s 6 seats, the last phase of voting in Maharashtra, the state witnesses polls in 19 constituencies including Mumbai. In the previous parliamentary elections in 2009, UPA allies Congress and NCP bagged had all six seats. For saffron alliance it is now also a prestige battle to regain some lost political honour.

South Mumbai witnesses interesting fights with union minister Milind Deora of the Congress facing three challengers this time: former banker Meera Sanyal of AAP, Shiv Sena's Arvind Sawant and Bala Nandagaonkar of the MNS. In 2009, Ms Sanyal fought as an Independent and lost. However, Deora's triumph was mainly because the MNS ate into the Sena votes. But observers say, the MNS does not have the same momentum and impact in 2014.

In Mumbai North East represented by NCP’s MP Sanjay Patil who had won 2009 polls narrowly trouncing BJP's Kirit Somaiya by just 3000 odd votes faces formidable challenges this time due his alleged non performance. While Somaiya seems to be the darling of the masses, social activist Medha Patkar of the AAP may play spoil sport.

Mumbai North Central constituency throws up an interesting fight: the "daughter vs daughter" battle. Sitting MP Priya Dutt and daughter of late Congress leader Sunil Dutt is pitted against Poonam Mahajan, the daughter of late BJP leader Pramod Mahajan. Dutt seems to be the frontrunner and banks heavily on the minority and slum votes.

In 2009 Congress’ Sanjay Nirupam trounced BJP strong contender by a mere 2000 votes in the Mumbai North constituency. But the seat has a large Gujarati population and BJP's Gopal Shetty is counting on the "Modi-wave".

But despite this, Mumbaikars are sluggish electorates with the polling in 2009 hardly exceeding 41.4%, South Mumbai being among the worst.