Buoyed by Bajoria defection, Shinde Sena-BJP look to edge out MVA in Legislative Council

On Tuesday, the Shinde Sena got its first breakthrough in the Legislative Council with Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) MLC Viplove Bajoria defecting to its fold. With Bajoria becoming the first Uddhav Sena MLC to switch loyalties, the Shinde faction said that this cycle has just begun.

With the BJP backing it, the Shinde Sena claimed that several Uddhav Sena

MLCs were “waiting” to cross over to the party, even as both the ruling allies are keen on garnering a majority in the Council too.

Currently, the Opposition alliance Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), comprising of the Uddhav Sena, Congress and NCP, has a majority in the 78-member Council as it has 33 MLCs as against the BJP-Shinde Sena’s 25 MLCs.

Of 20 vacant seats, 12 are of nominated members, whose appointment have been pending for about two years after former Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari refused to accept the names proposed by the then CM Uddhav-led MVA government. The remaining eight vacancies are local bodies constituencies.

The current partywise break-up in the Council is as follows: BJP (22), Shinde Sena (1), Uddhav Sena (10), Congress (8), NCP ( 9), PWP (1), JD( U) 1, and Independent (4).

A Shinde Sena insider said, “If a majority of MLCs from the Uddhav camp shift to the our faction, we can establish our political supremacy in the Council too.”

Given the MVA’s numerical edge in the Council, the BJP-Shinde Sena has to bank on the former’s support to get its legislation passed in the Upper House following their passage in the Assembly. Without the MVA’s consent, some key business of the Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis government would thus run the risk of being stalled.

The state BJP, for instance, has been looking to bring an anti-religious conversion bill. It has been under intense pressure from the right-wing organisations, including the RSS, VHP and Bajrang Dal, in this regard. Such legislation have been enacted in several BJP-ruled states including Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.

The Shinde-Fadnavis government is however aware that unless their camp has a majority in the Upper House it would not be able to enact the anti-conversion law.

Another initiative that the BJP-Shinde Sena wants to push is reforms in the cooperative sector, which have been pending for a long time. With the state cooperative sector remaining under the Congress-NCP control, there have been strong resistance to this proposal from the ruling camp.

In the 288-member Assembly, the BJP has 106 MLAs while the Shinde Sena accounts for 50 MLAs with their coalition having a comfortable majority.

The Shinde Sena claims to have wrested 40 of the total 56 MLAs and 12 of the 18 Lok Sabha MPs from the Uddhav Sena.

With the state now having a new Governor Ramesh Bais, the Shinde-Fadnavis government has decided to expedite the process of nomination of 12 members in the Upper House. However, the issue of these nominated MLCs has been pending in the Supreme Court, with the next hearing slated for March 22.

As per the stipulated norms for the election of the MLCs in the state, 30

of the total 78 MLC seats are elected by the MLAs. Twenty-two MLCs are elected from the local bodies from 21 divisions across the state. Seven MLC seats each are elected from the teachers as well as graduates constituencies from seven divisions.