BJP seeks to rehabilitate Pankaja, fields her for MLC seat, Cong again backs Pradnya Satav, Uddhav Sena to field Milind Narvekar

According to Matang leader Amit Gorkhe, since there are only five vacant seats in Maharashtra's Legislative Council and BJP have named five candidates, they will be elected unopposed.

Munde’s nomination to the Legislative Council is being seen as an attempt by the party to rehabilitate her after her defeat in the Lok Sabha election in Beed, where Munde lost to Bajrang Sonawane of the NCP (SP) in a closely fought contest. (File Image)

BJP leader Pankaja Munde, whose political career had received a big jolt when she lost the Lok Sabha elections last month, was nominated by her party to Maharashtra’s Legislative Council on Monday. BJP sources said the party seeks to rehabilitate her, given her importance as an OBC leader.

On the other hand, the Congress renominated Pradnya Satav, wife of late Congress leader Rajeev Satav who was close to Rahul Gandhi.

The Shiv Sena (UBT) is set to field Milind Narvekar, a close lieutenant of party chief Uddhav Thackeray, while the NCP (S-P) has decided to support Jayant Patil of the Peasants and Workers Party.

Along with Pankaja Munde, the BJP’s national leadership also named four other candidates for the Legislative Council biennial elections scheduled for July 12. They are farmer leader Sadabhau Khot, Amit Gorkhe from Pimpri-Chinchwad, former Hadapsar MLA Yogesh Tilekar and Dr Prinay Phuke.

The elections are being held to fill up 11 seats, which will fall vacant on July 27 when some members of the Legislative Council will retire. MLAs of the State Legislative Assembly vote for electing the MLCs. The Maharashtra Assembly has a strength of 288 MLAs. At present, it has 274 MLAs and the remaining seats are vacant. “This means, every member will need at least 23 votes of MLAs to get elected,” said BJP leader Sarang Kamtekar.

While Mahayuti has decided to field nine candidates and has claimed the support of 215 MLAs including indepedents, the MVA seems to have decided to field three candidates though they can get only two candidates elected. “If 12 candidates are in the fray for 11 vacant seats, then there is a possibility of an election taking place,” said political observer Avinash Chilekar.

Munde’s nomination to the Legislative Council is being seen as an attempt by the party to rehabilitate her after her defeat in the Lok Sabha election in Beed, where Munde had lost to Bajrang Sonawane of the NCP (SP) in a closely fought contest. “Pankaja Munde is an important OBC leader. She belongs to the Vanjari community. In the recent elections, the Marathas railed against her and she lost the elections. The OBC community now is on a warpath over the reservation issue. BJP must have chalked out an important role for Munde vis-a-vis the OBC versus Maratha duel,” said Chilekar.

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After Munde’s defeat in the family bastion, a couple of her supporters had died by suicide. A video of her breaking down while meeting the family members of one of her supporters who ended their lives went viral. ”This only shows the popularity of Munde among the masses. BJP will certainly try to cash in on this… Even otherwise, it does not have a charismatic woman leader like Munde,” said Chilekar.

Gorkhe, who is the former head of the Annabhau Sathe Mahamandal, is a leader of the Matang community and known for his proximity to Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. Gorkhe runs a clutch of educational institutes in Pimpri-Chinchwad.

When contacted, Gorkhe said, “I am delighted that the party has picked me to be an MLC. I will do my best as an MLC to raise people’s issues in the House.”

Gorkhe said that since there are only 11 vacant seats and five candidates have been nominated, the nominees will be elected unopposed as BJP has 105 MLAs. “BJP has the required numbers on our side. It has 105 MLAs. Each MLC might need the vote of 223 MLAs….Had the BJP fielded a sixth candidate, there would have been the possibility of a contest. Now since there are five candidates, it will be unopposed election,” he said.

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Gorkhe is the second BJP leader from Pimpri-Chinchwad to become an MLC, the first being Uma Khapre.

Farmer leader Sadabhau Khot, who fell out with his one-time mentor Raju Shetty and sided with BJP, said he will seize this opportunity to double his efforts for the farming community. “I have been working relentlessly for the farmers, farm labourers and different sections of the society. BJP has given me an opportunity…and I will do my best,” he said. Shetty took a jibe at Khot. “I don’t have to beg for such seats,” he said.

NCP (SP) spokesperson Mahesh Tapase said, “We have decided to back Jayant Patil of the PWP. We will not field our candidate.”

Shiv Sena (UBT) spokesperson Sanjay Raut said, “We have decided to field Milind Narvekar. He will file his papers tomorrow (July 2).”

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NCP spokesperson Umesh Patil said his party will field candidates. “From Mahayuti, there are going to be 9 candidates. Five from BJP, two from NCP and two are likely to be from Shiv Sena.”

Shiv Sena led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde has also decided to field two candidates. “Our names will be announced soon,” said Sena spokesperson Manisha Kayande.

Manoj Dattatrye More

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades. Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died. Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More

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