Voting for 11 Maharashtra Legislative Council seats ends, 274 MLAs cast votes

Mumbai, July 12 (IANS) Voting for 11 seats in the Maharashtra Legislative Council biennial election, which started on Friday at 9 a.m., concluded at 4 p.m. after 274 Assembly members cast their votes. There are 12 candidates in the fray for 11 seats.The winning quota for the election is pegged at 23, given the current strength of the 288-member Assembly is 274.The counting will begin at 5 p.m. and the result is expected late on Friday night.The ruling MahaYuti has fielded 9 nominees while the Maha Vikas Aghadi has fielded three.Cross-voting was feared due to horse-trading. However, both MahaYuti and MVA had taken due precautions to avoid this as they had kept their respective legislators in the various five-star hotels in the city and brought them to the legislature in special buses.The BJP has fielded five nominees including former minister Pankaja Munde, former ministers of state Parinay Fuke and Sadabhau Khot, former state youth wing chief Yogesh Tilekar, and party functionary Amit Gorkhe. The Shiv Sena has nominated former MPs Krupal Tumane and Bhavan Gawli while the NCP has fielded Rajesh Vitekar and Shivajirao Garje.The Congress has renominated Pradnya Satav, who is the wife of former MP Rajiv Satav while the Shiv Sena-UBT has fielded party chief Uddhav Thackeray’s close confidant Milind Narvekar. Outgoing Peasants and Workers Party lawmaker Jayant Patil has entered the fray with the support of the NCP-SP.The BJP has 103 legislators so the party is quite confident in the election of its five nominees. The Shiv Sena with its 37 legislators and support from 10 independents is sure of victory of two candidates. Further, NCP with its 39 legislators sees no problem in the victory of its two nominees.The Congress is confident in the victory of its lone nominee with its 37 legislators. Incidentally, PWP’s Patil and Shiv Sena-UBT nominee Narvekar are banking on excess votes from Congress and also from the support from 15 legislators of the Shiv Sena-UBT and 13 legislators of the NCP-SP.The biennial elections were necessitated due to the retirement of 11 MLCs – Manisha Kayande (Shiv Sena), Anil Parab (Shiv Sena-UBT), Vijay Girkar, Nilay Naik, Ramesh Patil, Ramrao Patil (BJP), Abdullah Durrani (NCP), Wajahat Mirza and Pragya Satav (Congress), Mahadev Jankar (RSP), and Jayant Patil (PWP).–IANSsj/vd