Thackeray's entry into legislature: EC may discuss demands for legislative council polls in Maharashtra

The Election Commission is likely to discuss on Friday demands for holding legislative council polls in Maharashtra which were deferred due to the spread of the coronavirus.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray who was sworn in on November 28 last year, has time till May 27 to get elected to the state legislature, failing which he will have to step down.

Maharashtra Governor B S Koshyari has now requested the Election Commission to declare polls for nine vacant seats in the Legislative Council.

Sources in the poll panel said though they have not received the communication of the governor so far, the issue could be discussed on Friday as all three ruling alliance partners in Maharashtra -- the Shiv Sena, the Nationalist Congress Party and the Congress -- have appealed to the EC to conduct the Legislative Council polls, saying social distancing and other precautions can be taken during the voting procedure.

Since the Raj Bhawan has written, the communication would also be on the Commission's table on Friday, the sources said.

Earlier, the state cabinet had recommended appointing the Shiv Sena chief as a member of the Legislative Council as a Governor's nominee, but there had been no progress on the proposal.

The Election Commission had deferred the elections to the nine legislative council seats that fell vacant on April 24 in view of the coronavirus pandemic.