After a poor show in the Lok Sabha elections, the BJP-led Mahayuti alliance swept the Maharashtra Legislative Council elections on Friday, with the alliance winning nine out of 11 seats.
Three BJP leaders – Pankaja Munde, Parinay Phuke, and Yogesh Tilekar – claimed victory after securing 26 votes each; the threshold for victory is 23. Two from Mr Pawar’s party – Rajesh Vitekar and Shivajirao Garje – were also declared winners, while Bhavana Gawli of the Shinde Sena also won. It is important to note that the Mahayuti alliance – consisting of the Bharatiya Janata Party, Shiv Sena (Eknath Shinde camp) and NCP (Ajit Pawar camp) – won the polls amid the threat of cross-voting.
The biennial elections were held to fill in vacancies of members whose term ends on July 27. Each winning candidate would need a quota of 23 first-preference votes.
“Heartiest congratulations to all the leaders of the NDA for registering this landslide victory in the Maharashtra MLC election,” BJP President JP Nadda said.
Mahayuti has also won all the nine seats it contested.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, whose Shiv Sena is part of the Mahayuti alliance, said, “We had confidence that our 9 candidates will win…Chamatkar hua hai..Not only Mahayuti MLAs voted for us but people of other parties also supported us based on development work done by us.”
The BJP fielded five candidates and its ally Shiv Sena two. Their Mahayuti partner NCP nominated two candidates.
From the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) bloc, the Shiv Sena (UBT) and Congress fielded one candidate each, while the NCP (SP) backed the PWP nominee Jayant Patil.
With inputs from PTI
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Maharashtra Legislative Council polls: BJP-led Mahayuti alliance sweeps election, wins 9 of 11 seats
