Mumbai:
It is not just the government that is at stake in Maharashtra, but it is also the large chunk of 7 Rajya Sabha and 29 Legislative Council seat’s that are falling vacant, or have fallen vacant (1 Legislative Council seat) that are at stake in the political tug-of-war between the ruling estranged Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Shiv Sena. Majority of 21 of the 29 Legislative Council seat’s that will be up for grabs between April to June 2020 are from the Elected by MLAs (EMLAs) constituency and Governor Nominated members.
The BJP and the Shiv Sena can win sizeable number of seats if they stay together as alliance partners and form the government. Given the current strength of the newly constituted 14th Legislative Assembly, the BJP and Sena together have support of 179 MLAs. If the Sena joins hands with the Congress, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), then their combined tally goes up to 172 MLAs.
The MLAs can only vote for the 9 EMLA constituency vacancies. Much will also depend upon how the 13 Independent MLAs and other smaller parties vote or support either the ruling alliance or the opposition. Nominating candidates for the 12 Governor Nominated members seat’s is entirely under the control of the government in power. There is no voting involved in the Governor Nominated members constituency. In respect of both the constituencies in the Legislative Council, it is being in power that counts.
The poll season will kick-off with 7 Rajya Sabha seat’s that will fall vacant on April 2, 2020. Among the sitting members who are retiring include – Sharad Pawar and Adv Majid Memon (both NCP), Union Minister for Social Justice and RPI-A leader Ramdas Athawale, Hussain Dalwai (Congress), Amar Sable (BJP), Rajkumar Dhoot (Shiv Sena) and Sanjay Kakade (Independent). The quota of votes required for winning the Rajya Sabha seat is 36 votes.
In the Legislative Council, one immediate vacancy is caused as NCPs leader of opposition, Dhananjay Munde will have to resign as he is now elected to the lower house, the Legislative Assembly from Parli constituency in the just concluded elections. Besides this, NCPs Rahul Narvekar resigned from his membership, joined the BJP and won from the Colaba assembly seat in the just concluded assembly elections. Ramrao Wadkute (NCP) quit his membership and joined the BJP before the assembly elections.
While, Munde’s term as member in the upper house is to end on July 7, 2022. Narvekar and Wadkute were both elected to the upper house from the Governor Nominated quota seats and their term as members is to expire on June 6, 2020. Whoever, gets elected to Munde’s seat will get to serve the remainder of the two year term as member of the upper house.
Out of the 9 EMLA seats that are to fall vacant on April 24, 2020, three seats are currently held by the Congress, 3 by NCP, BJP 2, Sena 1 and Peoples Republican Party (PRP) 1. Prominent amongst those who are retiring in April 2020, include Sena’s Deputy Chairman of Legislative Council, Dr Neelam Gorhe, Chandrakant Raghuvanshi (Congress), Hemant Takle (NCP), Smita Wagh (BJP) amongst others. Chandrakant Raghuvanshi has resigned from his membership in the upper house. Here the quota of votes required to win the seat is 28 votes.
Whereas, the 12 Governor Nominated members their term of membership is to end on June 6, 2020. Of the 12 seats, Congress has 5, NCP 6 and PRP 1. Prominent amongst those who are retiring on June 6, include – Arch. Anant Gadgil (Congress) and Vidya Chavan (NCP) amongst others. The term of membership of PRP’s Jogendra Kawade however, will end on June 15, 2020.
Besides these, there are five other vacancies that will be caused on July 19, 2020. These include – three Graduates division constituencies and two Teachers division constituencies. The three MLCs from the Graduates constituency who are retiring are – Satish Chavan – Aurangabad Graduates – NCP, Chandrakant Patil – Pune Graduates and Anil Sole – Nagpur Graduates (both BJP). The two MLCs from Teachers division constituency who are retiring are – Shrikant Deshpande – Amravati Teachers and Dattatray Sawant – Pune Teachers (both are Independent MLCs).
