Rejecting the offer from the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) of an additional seat in next month’s legislative council polls, Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday decided to not withdraw its third candidate from the June 10 biennial Rajya Sabha polls, paving way for a contest for the sixth seat.
A delegation of the MVA comprising Minister and senior NCP leader Chhagan Bhujbal, Minister and Congress leader Sunil Kedar and Shiv Sena leader Anil Desai held a meeting on Friday with Leader of the Opposition Devendra Fadnavis and State BJP chief Chandrakant Patil. The delegation presented a proposal to avoid election on June 10.
As polls would take place on June 10, the Shiv Sena has directed all its MLAs to be present in Mumbai before June 8 and all its MLAs and independents would be lodged in Hotel Trident till the election is over. The NCP has already approached the court seeking permission for two of its jailed MLAs, Anil Deshmukh and Nawab Malik, to vote in the election.
“We offered them an additional seat in the State Council if they withdraw the third candidate in the Rajya Sabha polls. This would have ensured both these elections go unopposed,” said Mr. Bhujbal after the meeting.
BJP’s counter-offer
Rejecting the offer, the BJP presented a counter-offer to the MVA. “We told them that we being a national party will contest the Rajya Sabha poll and in return won’t fight the council polls,” said Mr. Patil, adding that the BJP was confident of contesting and winning three Rajya Sabha seats. Mr. Patil said that in any case, the decision of withdrawing the nomination of an official BJP candidate was not within the powers of the State committee, but Delhi would have to approve it. “We conveyed our stand to Delhi and they expressed satisfaction with what we have done,” he said.
As both sides rejected the offer and counter-offer, seven candidates remained in fray for six seats as June 3 was the last day to withdraw nomination.
As per the present calculations, each candidate requires 42 votes to get elected to the Rajya Sabha. As a result of death of one of its MLAs, the Shiv Sena’s strength stands at 55 while that of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) is 53 and of the Congress is 44. Based on this, three candidates of the MVA will be elected with ease.
For BJP, with its 106 MLAs and support of six others (including four independents), victory of two of its candidates is certain. The battle will be for the sixth seat between the Sena’s Sanjay Pawar and the BJP’s Dhananjay Mahadik.
The NCP has already announced to transfer its extra votes to ally Sena’s second candidate Sanjay Pawar. Apart from three parties, Prahar (2), Krantikari Shetkari Party (1) are part of the State government. It could get support of the Samajwadi Party (2), the CPI(M) (1), the Swabhimani Party (1), the Peasants and Workers Party (1) and nine independents.
Three MLAs of the Bahujan Vikas Aghadi (BVA), two from the AIMIM and a lone MLA from the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) have yet not opened their cards.
