EC throws lifeline to Uddhav, decides to hold council polls on May 21

The Election Commission on Friday decided to hold polls to fill up the nine vacancies in the state legislative council of Maharashtra on May 21 even as the nationwide lockdown imposed to contain the Covid-19 pandemic was extended for two more weeks beyond Sunday.

The EC’s decision came as a lifeline to Shiv Sena supremo Uddhav Thackeray, who would have to get elected to any of the Houses of the bicameral legislature of Maharashtra by May 27 to continue in the office of the State’s Chief Minister. He is now expected to contest for any of the nine seats in the State Legislative Council.

The nine seats fell vacant on April 24 last, but the EC had on April 3 already deferred the elections in view of the COVID-19 outbreak and the lockdown imposed to contain it. With Maharashtra being the worst affected by the outbreak and the lockdown unlikely to be completely withdrawn from the State even after the end of its second phase on Sunday, uncertainty loomed large over the scheduling of the polls and thus over the continuation of Thackeray in the office of the Chief Minister.

The EC, however, came to his rescue on Friday – a day after Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari nudged it to consider holding the polls stating that the ground situation in the state was now contained.

The EC announced its decision to hold the polls after the Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora had a video conference with the two other Election Commissioners, Ashok Lavasa and Sushil Chandra, early on Friday.

Arora is currently stranded in the United States due to the ban on the arrival of any international commercial passenger aircraft to any airport in India.

The EC took note of a letter it received from the State Government, which assured the commission that it was ready to ensure strict adherence to the social distancing norms during the polling, in addition to the measures to maintain hygiene as well as other conditions stipulated by the authorities to stop the spread of the COVID-19 virus. The poll-panel asked the Union Home Secretary and the Maharashtra Chief Secretary to depute an officer each from the Central and the State Governments to ensure that the polling is held with strict adherence to all extant measures enforced by the competent authorities to contain the outbreak.

Koshyari wrote to the EC after Thackeray called up Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday and complained to him about an attempt to create political instability in Maharashtra.

The Governor had earlier refrained from acting on the recommendations of the State Cabinet headed by Thackeray to nominate the Chief Minister as a member of the legislative council.

Thackeray’s call to Modi was followed by Koshyari’s nudge to the EC and finally the poll panel's decision on Friday to go ahead and hold the elections. It is being seen as a sign of a thaw in the Shiv Sena’s relations with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). It came less than six months after the Shiv Sena broke its alliance with the BJP, entered into a coalition with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party, and formed a government in the State.

The EC stated that the notification for polling for the nine seats of the Legislative Council of Maharashtra would be issued on May 4, with the last day for submitting and withdrawal of nominations being May 11 and May 14. The polling would be held on May 21. The votes will be counted and the results will be declared on the same day.

The EC stated that it had taken note of the past precedents when it had conducted by-elections to fulfill “similar constitutional requirement” (like the one of Thackeray to get elected to either the Legislative Assembly or the Legislative Council within six months of taking oath as Chief Minister). The commission noted that it had been a consistent practice in the past.

The poll-panel also cited the examples of the Prime Ministers and the Chief Ministers it had thrown lifeline to in the past - former Prime Ministers P V Narasimha Rao and H D Deve Gowda in 1991 and 1996 respectively, several Chief Ministers of the States, including Ashok Gehlot (Rajasthan) in 1991, Rabri Devi (Bihar) in 1997 and Vijay Bhaskar Reddy (Andhra Pradesh) in 1993.