Beed: In an emotional yet bitterly contested by-poll, the people of Massajog village in Beed district rejected caste and sympathy politics to elect a prominent local leader Swarupanand Deshmukh as their new Sarpanch, defying most political punditry. Swarupanand edged past his rival, Ashwini Deshmukh - widow of the slain Sarpanch Santosh Pandit Deshmukh, a local Bharatiya Janata Party leader killed in December 2024 - by a narrow margin of 92 votes. The by-election, held on Tue