Smarting from its setback in the recently concluded Rajya Sabha elections, the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA)‘s coalition parties of the Shiv Sena, the NCP and the Congress have asked all its legislators to gather in Mumbai ahead of the crucial June 20 Maharashtra Legislative Council polls even as senior Congressman and Minister Satej Patil refuted suggestions of ‘poor coordination’ between the three allies.
Speaking in Pune, Deputy Chief Minister and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Ajit Pawar said that all MLAs of the three parties have been instructed to come to Mumbai from June 18, ahead of the Council election.
Eleven candidates are in the fray for the 10 MLC seats, with the three MVA parties each fielding two candidates while the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is fielding five candidates. The victory quota is around 26 votes as the strength of the 288-member Legislature has now reduced to 285, following the demise of Sena MLA Ramesh Latke and the arrest of two NCP leaders Nawab Malik and Anil Deshmukh.
‘Hotel politics’ in full swing
Given that the fear of cross-voting is rife after the BJP’s Rajya Sabha poll jolt to the MVA, the latter is going all-out to keep its flock together. ‘Hotel politics’ has begun in full swing with the BJP, too, summoning their 106 MLAs to Mumbai on June 18 and housing them in the Taj President Hotel in South Mumbai ahead of the polls.
The BJP, led by Devendra Fadnavis, had rattled the MVA by scoring a surprise victory on the hotly-contested sixth RS seat by cannily securing support of independent MLAs. With a number of independents, who were expected to side with the MVA ultimately voting for the BJP, bitter recriminations ensued after the RS poll result with Shiv Sena naming no less than six independent MLAs as being responsible for the defeat of the Sena’s candidate, while accusing the BJP at the Centre for ‘misusing Central agencies’ to change the outcome of the results.
Remarking that the MVA had learnt from its shortcomings in the RS poll, Congressman Satej Patil said that the coalition would win all six seats it was contesting on while alleging there was tremendous internal resentment brewing within the Maharashtra BJP.
“There is resentment in every district among the BJP’s OBC MLAs, who are disgruntled that [OBC leader] Pankaja Munde was denied justice by not being given a nomination,” said Mr. Patil, who is Kolhapur’s Guardian Minister.
He further said it was wrong to say there was ineffectual coordination between the Shiv Sena, the Congress and the NCP during the RS poll.
“There was problem with the combined votes of the 150-odd MLAs of the three parties. But we had no control over the votes cast by independents,” he said.
Even as Mr. Patil said all was well between the three parties, Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut said while the Sena and the NCP had the wherewithal to get both its candidates elected, the Congress would have to fight for its second candidate.
“We [Shiv Sena] have the capacity to win two seats. The NCP, while falling short of a few votes, can easily scrape through and get both its candidates elected. However, while one of the two Congress candidates will surely get elected, they will have to fight to secure votes for their second candidate,” Mr. Raut said, while making clear that the Sena did not have enough leftover votes to give the Congress’ second candidate.
The Shiv Sena currently has 55 MLAs, while the NCP’s voting strength is down to 51, given that Mr. Deshmukh and Mr. Malik are behind bars. The Congress has 44 legislators.
While the opposition BJP has 106, the RS polls saw that it had the support of at least 17 independent legislators and MLAs from the smaller parties.
Given that Mr. Raut’s remarks against the independents following the MVA’s defeat on the sixth RS seat has alienated them, the BJP is hoping to cash-in on their support for the MLC poll as well.
