By Raju Vernekar
Mumbai, July 03:
Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) MLA Rahul Narvekar (45) was elected the Speaker of the Maharashtra State Legislative Assembly after he defeated Shiv Sena candidate MLA Rajan Salvi by 57 votes in an election held by a voice vote in Vidhan Bhavan in Mumbai on Sunday. Narvekar secured 164 votes against Salvi who bagged 107 votes.
The election was conducted by headcount against BJP’s earlier demand to hold the Speaker’s election by a secret ballot. The outgoing Deputy Speaker Narhari Zirwal (NCP) presided over the election process.
The whip was issued by Shiv Sena whip MLA Sunil Prabhu to the Shiv Sena MLAs to vote for Salvi. Whereas MLA Bharat Ghogawale (the rebel group led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde), had issued another whip claiming to represent the Shiv Sena. The Shiv Sena rebels followed Ghogawale’s whip, while the original Shiv Sena group followed Prabhu’s whip.
The post of assembly speaker has been lying vacant since Nana Patole of Congress resigned in February last year to become the party’s state unit president. Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari had refused to permit the Speaker’s election on the ground that a petition was pending in the Bombay High court on the issue. The matter was pending since March 15 last year.
The first-time BJP legislator Rahul Narvekar represents the Colaba Assembly constituency in south Mumbai. Whereas, Salvi is the MLA from the Rajapur segment in Ratnagiri district in the Konkan region.
Narvekar is a lawyer by profession. He had been a corporator and two-time legislator (since he was Governor’s nominee in the legislative council earlier). He was with Shiv Sena, then the NCP, and eventually landed in the BJP camp.
Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis, Ajit Pawar( NCP), Abu Azami (Samnajwadi Party), Bacchu Kadu(Independent –Prahar Janshakti), Sudhir Mungantiwar (BJP), Jayant Patil (NCP), Dhananjay Munde (NCP) Deepak Kesarkar(Shiv Sena rebel), Nana Patole (Congress), Aditya Thackeray (Shiv Sena) and others spoke on a motion to congratulate Narvekar. AIMIM abstained from voting.
Abu Azami expressed displeasure over the recent renaming of Aurangabad as Sambhaji Nagar by the outgoing Uddhav Thackeray led MVA Government. This was an attempt to hurt the sentiments of the Muslims, he claimed.
Narvekar in his speech, thanked all members and assured the house that he would deliver justice impartially.
The newly sworn-in Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, in whose cabinet BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis is the deputy CM, will face the floor test on Monday in a special two-day Assembly session.
With Narevkar’s election as the Assembly Speaker, the Maharashtra State legislature will be witnessing a son-in-law and father-in-law duo holding top posts in the Assembly and Council respectively since Narvekar is the son-in-law of Ramraje Naik Nimbalkar, Chairman of the State Legislative Council. Narvekar is married to Nimbalkar’s daughter Sarojini.
Nimbalkar’s term as a Chairman comes to end on Thursday. He was re-elected as an MLC on June 20. As such he will be required to contest the Chairman’s election again if fielded by NCP.
In the 78-member Maharashtra Legislative Council, the BJP has 24 members. If it can nominate 12 more members, then its way to claim the Chairman’s post will be easy. The Government led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde is likely to present the list of 12 nominated members to Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari, who did not clear the earlier list submitted by the MVA Government for nearly two years. Eventually, the MVA Government lost the opportunity to nominate members of its choice.
