Numbers favour Cong but BJP’s demand for secret voting makes fight interesting
The ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) and the Opposition BJP are set for a numerical showdown in the Maharashtra Assembly on Sunday when senior Congress MLA Nana Patole takes on the Kisan Kathore of the BJP in the crucial Maharashtra Assembly Speaker’s election.
Given the staked up numbers in the House and the fact that Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray won the trust vote by securing the support of 169 MLAs in the 288-member House, Patole’s victory in the Speaker’s election seems a foregone conclusion.
But, the BJP — with strength of 105 MLAs of its own and another 10 MLAs supporting it — is likely to demand secret voting in the Speaker’s poll. It is quite unlikely that Protem Speaker Dilip Walse Patil will allow secret ballot. Instead, he may resort to head count to elect the new Speaker.
It has long been a tradition in Maharashtra to have the Speaker elected unopposed. However, with fierce rivalry prevailing between the ruling MVA and Opposition BJP, the Amit Shah-led party will not let the election go uncontested.
Patole being in the fray is another reason for the BJP to put up a fight in the Speaker’s election.
Patole, who had been elected to Lok Sabha in the 2014 polls from Bhandara-Gondiya constituency on a BJP ticket, now represents the Congress from Sakoli Assembly segment in Vidarbha region.
It may be recalled that Patole had created a major stir in the political circles in August 2017 by saying that Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not like party men asking him questions making no bones about his unhappiness about the state of affairs in the ruling BJP.
On August 31 Patole had said, “Modi doesn’t like to take any questions. He had got very angry when I raised some issues about the OBC Ministry and farmer suicides at a meeting of BJP MPs. When Modi is asked questions, he asks you if you have read the party manifesto and are aware of various Government schemes”.
Patole had unsuccessfully contested the 2019 Lok Sabha polls against senior BJP leader from Nagpur Nitin Gadkari. While Gadkari had polled 6.60,221 votes, Patole had secured 4,44,212.
A bitter critic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Patole had resigned from the Lok Sabha and BJP. Subsequently, he joined the Congress in December 2017
Relatively, Khatore is a light weight politician. Kathore was elected as Thane Zilla Parishad president in 2002. He became MLA for the first time in 2004 on NCP ticket from Ambernath in Thane district.
Kathore went on to win 2009, 2014 and 2019 assembly elections from Murbad. He contested the 2014 and 2019 elections on BJP’s ticket.