10 candidates in fray for nine Maha Council seats

Legislative Council (LC) Chairman Shivajirao Deshmukh and Leader of Opposition Vinod Tawde are among the 10 candidates who are in fray for the March 20 elections for the nine seats of the upper house of the State Legislature in Maharashtra.
The 288-member legislative assembly is the electoral college for the elections and a candidate has to secure 29 votes to win.
Congress has renominated Deshmukh and also put up new faces in Haribhau Rathod and Chandrakant Suryavanshi, while BJP has renominated Tawde and senior leader Pandurang Phundkar.
All the five candidates filed their papers on the last date of filing of nominations today.

NCP's Hemant Takle, Anand Thakur and Kiran Pawaskar have already filed their papers along with Shiv Sena's Neelam Gorhe and Rahul Narvekar.
Congress said that it has enough numbers to get all his nominees elected in the first preference votes. The party has claimed support of 99 MLAs including 81 party legislators, 17 independents and one nominated member. BJP has 46 MLAs and Shiv Sena 45 but do not have adequate numbers to get their second candidate elected.

BJP leaders Tawde and Ashish Shelar visited MNS chief Raj Thackeray's home for the second time in week seeking support of its 11 MLAs. MNS MLA Harshvardhan Jadhav has joined Sena.

It is speculated that Sena's second candidate Rahul Narvekar may withdraw. However, Narvekar told reporters that there was no question of his withdrawing from the race.
Tomorrow is the day of scrutiny of nomination papers and March 12 the last date of withdrawal of names.
Sources said if elections were held, the second candidate of Sena or NCP's third candidate could lose.
The party wise strength of various political parties the Legislative Assembly is: Congress-81, NCP-62, BJP-46, Shiv Sena-45, MNS-12, PWP-4, SP-3, Jan Surajya Shakti, Bahujan Vikas Agadhi two each, Bharipa Bahujan Mahasangh, Lok Sangram, Rashtriya Samaj Party, Swabhimani Party one each and 24 independents.