JOIN USMaharashtra's Rajya Sabha polls crucial for BJP, MVA government
The Rajya Sabha elections next month for six seats from Maharashtra is set to be interesting with a contest in sight given the arithmetic in the state's Vidhan Sabha.
The retiring members are Piyush Goyal, Dr Vinay Sahasrabuddhe, Dr Vikas Mahatme (all from BJP), P Chidambaram (Congress), Praful Patel (NCP) and Sanjay Raut (Shiv Sena).
With Yuvraj Sambhajiraje Chhatrapati - the 13th direct descendant of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, the iconic Maratha warrior, and great-grandson of Rajarshi Chhatrapati Shahu Maharaj, the legendary social reformer, deciding to contest as an Independent, the contest has becoming interesting.
Sambhajiraje was the President-nominated Rajya Sabha member from June 13, 2016 to May 3, 2022.
While, Sambhajiraje had decided to contest as an independent and seek support of all political parties, none of the parties have made any commitment.
For both the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi and opposition BJP, the polls are crucial.
While none of the parties have declared the candidates officially - the BJP is set to repeat Goyal, who Minister of Textiles, Minister of Commerce and Industry in the Narendra Modi-government, Shiv Sena would give nomination again to Raut, the party’s chief spokesperson and pointsman and NCP will field Patel, the close aide of NCP founder-President Sharad Pawar and the party’s General Secretary.
The electoral college is the 288-member Maharashtra Legislative Assembly - and a candidate needs 42 votes to win the berth to the upper house.
Shiv Sena MLA Ramesh Latke had died recently.
The MVA has 170 MLAs - Shiv Sena (55), NCP (53), Congress (44), smaller parties/groups (10) and Independents (8).
On the other hand, BJP has strength of 106 and has support of smaller parties/groups (2) and Independents (5).
Given the arithmetic in the Vidhan Sabha, the BJP can get two members elected while the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress, one each.
The contest would be for the sixth seat - and in case BJP decides to field a third candidate, it would be a sort of acid test for the MVA.
Maharashtra Chief Minister and Shiv Sena President Uddhav Thackeray and NCP supremo Sharad Pawar are in touch with each other on the issue of a fourth seat or the MVA. Thackeray had held informal meetings with Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar of the NCP and state Revenue Minister and CLP leader Balasaheb Thorat.
It may be mentioned, during the April, 2020 RS polls, NCP nominee Fauzia Khan had won because Shiv Sena transferred excess votes and the NCP will make a similar gesture to Shiv Sena this time.
Last week, Sambhajiraje met Leader of Opposition and ex-Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis but the former said that it was to thank him and the BJP leadership for giving the opportunity for his term as Rajya Sabha member. But he made it clear that he would not contest as an Independent and expected that the big four parties, smaller parties and Independents would support him.