Mumbai:

After coming second in Maharashtra in the recently-held Lok Sabha polls, sources said the ruling alliance in the state plans to fight the assembly elections without a Chief Minister face. Elections in the state are slated to be held in September-October this year.

The BJP-led Mahayuti alliance won 17 seats in Maharashtra in the Lok Sabha polls, while the Opposition alliance won 30.

Bharatiya Janata Party is keen on fielding over 160 candidates to contest for the 288-member legislative assembly. The alliance is also unlikely to project a chief ministerial face opting instead for a collective leadership approach, a blow to Maharashtra Chief Minister and Shiv Sena chief Eknath Shinde.

Elections for the Maharashtra Assembly, which has 288 seats, will be a straight face-off between the Mahayuti and the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi alliance. The ruling Mahayuti – part of the larger NDA alliance – consists of the BJP, the Eknath Shinde faction of the Shiv Sena and the Ajit Pawar wing of the NCP.

Sources within the party also said that Ajit Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party will contest the elections as part of the alliance, ending speculation about his future. After Ajit Pawar’s NCP won just one Lok Sabha seat, there was a strong buzz that MLAs from his party were looking to jump ship and return to the faction of the party led by Sharad Pawar.

The Maha Vikas Aghadi, which is under the INDIA umbrella, has the Congress, Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) and the NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) as its key constituents.

BJP cadres have been actively working to increase their voter base after the Lok Sabha poll jolt. The party registered a big win in last week’s MLC polls. The BJP fielded five candidates, including Pankaja Munde, the daughter of late senior leader Gopinath Munde. All five won. The Shinde Sena and Ajit Pawar’s NCP named two each. All four won.

This is also only the second time that elections were held in Maharashtra’s unique political environment, where the split of two regional parties has led to two Shiv Senas and two NCPs – under very similar but different names – being pitted against each other. The Lok Sabha polls were the first round and parties from both sides and both sides pulled out all stops to ensure that they came out tops in the second. The MLC polls were dubbed as the semi-finals, a precursor to the upcoming assembly polls where both alliances would want to emerge victorious.

Mumbai:

In a worrying sign for the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi in Maharashtra, which was riding high after winning 30 of 48 Lok Sabha seats in the state, at least seven Congress MLAs cross-voted for candidates from the ruling Mahayuti alliance in the Legislative Council polls on Friday, sources said. 

The polls, which are generally a straightforward affair, were seen as the semi-finals ahead of the Maharashtra Assembly elections – expected to be held around November – because 12 candidates were vying for 11 seats. 

The opposition alliance had forced the election by fielding one more candidate than it had the numbers to elect, possibly hoping to benefit from cross-voting by MLAs from the ruling coalition, but seems to have ended up losing votes instead.

The Maharashtra Assembly has a strength of 288 MLAs but currently has 274 sitting legislators. This meant that each MLC candidate needed 23 first-preference votes to win.

The Mahayuti – part of the larger NDA alliance – which consists of the BJP, the Eknath Shinde faction of the Shiv Sena and the Ajit Pawar wing of the NCP, fielded nine candidates and had 201 MLAs, including Independents and smaller parties, backing it. 

The Maha Vikas Aghadi, which is under the INDIA umbrella, has the Congress, Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) and the NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) as its key constituents and had put up three candidates despite having the support of only 67 MLAs. 

Six MLAs, including an independent, were neutral. 

The Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) was hoping that it would get some votes from the Mahayuti, especially amid the buzz of some leaders from the Ajit Pawar NCP group being in touch with the Sharad Pawar faction.

The candidate backed by the Sharad Pawar faction, Jayant Patil of the Peasants and Workers Party, however, lost because he did not get enough votes. The Congress candidate and the Shiv Sena (UBT) candidate sailed through, as did five from the BJP and two each from the Shinde Shiv Sena and Ajit Pawar’s NCP.

Sources said the Congress, which has 37 MLAs, had fixed a quota of 30 first-preference votes for its candidate Pradyna Satav, and seven remaining votes were to go to Milind Narvekar of the Shiv Sena UBT. 

Mr Satav got 25 first preference votes and Mr Narvekar got 22, which means at least seven Congress MLAs cross-voted, they added.

Pune:

NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar on Thursday said the Opposition MVA alliance outperformed the ruling coalition in 155 assembly segments in Maharashtra in the Lok Sabha elections, and it indicated the people’s “mood” as state polls are around the corner.

Assembly elections are due in the state in October.

The Maha Vikas Aghadi allies NCP (SP), Shiv Sena (UBT) and Congress together contested all 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra and won 31, Pawar said, speaking to reporters here.

“The outcome reflects the people’s wishes….if you see (voting patterns in) assembly constituencies within these 31 seats, we secured victory in 155 assembly segments. The outcome reflects the mood of the people for assembly elections,” he said.

Asked about opposition to the proposed Nagpur-Goa ‘Shaktipeeth’ expressway, he said there must be some reason for it, and the government should explain why it was keen on the project.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)