Mumbai The Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) is expected to gain two additional seats in the legislative council after the elections next month on the basis of the collective strength it has in the legislative assembly.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has announced the polls to the council seats on June 20.
Nine seats of the council will become vacant on July 7, while the one which was held by Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) RN Singh became vacant after his demise on January 2.
Of the 10 seats, six members are from BJP, two each from Nationalist Congress Party and Shiv Sena. They were elected on the basis of the strength of the parties six years ago.
In the backdrop of the changed political equations and the existing strength, the three ruling parties can win two seats each, while opposition BJP will lose two seats and win four seats, against the outgoing number of six members.
“This time, we could win only four seats based on our strength in the lower house. The names will be finalised at an appropriate time,” said Maharashtra BJP’s vice president Madhav Bhandari.
The members retiring on July 7 are Sadasjhiv Khot, Sujitsinh Thakur, Pravin Darekar, Prasad Lad, Vinayak Mete from BJP; Subhash Desai, Diwakar Raote from Shiv Sena; and Ramraje Naik Nimbalkar, Sanjay Daund from NCP.
“BJP is unlikely to renominate Vinayak Mete and Sadashiv Khot- the two members from BJP’s smaller allies elected to the upper house when the party was in power for five years. The party will renominate Darekar who is leader of opposition in the upper house and party whip Prasad Lad. For the other two seats, Kripashankar Singh, Chitra Wagh are in the race. Sujitsinh Thakur too has fair chances of renomination,” said a BJP leader on the condition of anonymity.
Sena is unlikely to renominate Raote and may send its leader Milind Narvekar to the upper house. NCP is expected to renominate council chairman Ramraje Nimbalkar while the renomination of Daund is bleak.
The council seats are to be elected from the members of state assembly, and each seat requires at least 27 votes to win. With 106 members in the lower house and support of at least eight members from smaller parties and independents, the BJP is eyeing four seats. The three ruling parties (Shiv Sena-56, NCP-53 and Congress-44) collectively have the strength of 170 members including independents and smaller parties and can win six seats. Since the ruling parties and the opposition BJP have no additional strength to go for an additional seat, 10 members are expected to be elected unopposed.
BJP has the highest members in the upper house at 24, followed by Shiv Sena (13), NCP (10) and Congress (9). Fifteen seats in the upper house are vacant including 12 to be nominated from the governor quota. Three members are from smaller parties while four in the upper house are independents.
