MUMBAI, MAY 13: The BJP and Shiv Sena today urged the Chief Election Commissioner M S Gill, who is in the city to review poll arrangements, to hold the mid-term Lok Sabha elections in Maharashtra in the first week of October and the elections to the State assembly only in February-March next year.The term of present Assembly ends in March 2000 and legally, elections can be held six months before the term expires. The Election Commission is against repeating the mammoth task of holding elections within a span of six months. Holding separate elections will cost an additional Rs 150 crore to the state exchequer and apart from arranging security and a special work force. The EC is expected to take the final decision in the matter in next month.Interestingly, Chief Minister Narayan Rane, who today met Gill and strongly opposed early elections to Maharashtra Assembly, contradicted his own public statement made a few weeks ago that the Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance was ready for Assembly elections in June 1999.Subsequently, the state Chief Secretary P Subrahmanyam had even written a letter to the Election Commission saying if elections were to be held for Lok Sabha and Assembly jointly, they should be held in June as it rains heavily in most areas of the state during September Rane had also said in a press conference last week that the ``sympathy wave'' in favour of Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee would help the alliance secure more seats in the state Assembly.However, when Rane met Gill at Raj Bhavan for over 45 minutes today, he plainly told the latter that the state government does not want early elections for the Assembly.Rane told Gill that Lok Sabha elections in Maharashtra should be held in first week of October. The CM pointed out that the entire Konkan belt receives heavy showers in September and it will be difficult for people to come out and vote. Moreover, large scale farming activities are on all over the state in September which will directly affect the percentage of voting, Rane reportedly told Gill. Rane's emphasis on Konkan belt is significant as the alliance has received impressive votes in its favour from this area in last two elections.Gill also met various officials and political leaders and discussed different angles for holding simultaneous elections for Lok Sabha and state Assembly.A delegation of state BJP unit led by Planning Board vice chairman Prakash Jawdekar, and general secretary of BJP Mumbai, Atul Bhatkalkar met Gill and urged that the lok sabha polls in the state be held between October five and ten. Deputy chief minister Gopinath Munde said that the delegation also demanded that the code of conduct should come into force from the date of filing of nominations till the day of voting, and not soon after the election schedule is announced.
