Maharashtra Speaker Nana Patole resigned from his post on Thursday, amid an intense speculation that he would be appointed as the State Congress chief.
After calling on Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, Patole met Deputy Speaker Narhari Zirwal and handed over his resignation from his post as the Speaker. Pending the election of a new Speaker, Zirwal will function as the Speaker of the State Assembly.
Informed sources in the Congress said that Patole had put in his papers after he met party’s senior leader and former president Rahul Gandhi in New Delhi on Wednesday.
Thursday’s development came in the backdrop of the fact that Congress high command was seriously considering appointing a full-fledged Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) president in place of State Revenue Minister Balasaheb Thorat, who is holding MPCC chief’s post as an additional responsibility.
Within hours after the resignation of Patole’s resignation from Speaker’s post, NCP chief Sharad Pawar sparked a new debate in the state political circles through a statement that there would be fresh negotiations among the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) — Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress — to choose a new nominee for the vacant Speaker’s post in the State Assembly.
Talking to media persons in the national capital, Pawar said: “All the three MVA constituents had a role in appointing the outgoing Speaker. Now that this post has become vacant, there will now be discussion among the leaders of the three MVA constituents to decide on the choice of a new Speaker’s post.
Queried if the Speaker’s post would continue to remain with the Congress, Pawar said: “This will be decided after discussions. Now that the vacancy has arisen it is likely that all the three parties will deliberate on the issue”.
During the impending discussions among the three MVA constituents on the choice of the Speaker, the NCP is likely to stake a claim for the post. The Congress will in all likelihood retain the post.
However, it is quite unlikely that the Congress will give up the post, a post that it had got after grandstanding and considerable haggling that took place in the talks over the sharing of power in the government after the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress came together and formed the MVA dispensation in the state in the last week of November 2019.
The Congress high command may have now decided to appoint Patole as the new MPCC chief, but his name was seriously considered for the party post in the run-up to the formation of the MVA government in Maharashtra in November 2019. However, the party agreed to let him become the State Assembly Speaker.
Patole is an MLA from Sakoli Assembly segment in Vidarbha region. He had earlier been elected to the State Assembly for three terms between 1999 and 2014. He was elected to Lok Sabha in the 2014 polls from Bhandara-Gondiya constituency on a BJP ticket.
It may be recalled that Patole had created a major stir in the political circles in the last week of August 2017 by saying that Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not like party men asking him questions. He had in the process made no bones about his unhappiness about the state of affairs in the ruling BJP.
Patole had said on August 31, 2017: “Modi doesn’t like to take any questions. He 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 resigned from *the Lok Sabha and BJP. Subsequently, he joined the Congress in December 2017.
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 votes.
In October 2019, Patole contested and won the Sakoli seat to enter the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly and was later elected the Speaker after the MVA government assumed office in November 2019.