For the first time, the legislative council of Maharashtra will have no Muslim member after July 27. The only sitting Muslim MLCs, Wajahat Mirza of Congress and Abdullah Khan Durrani of NCP will complete their terms on July 27 and there is no Muslim candidate in the fray for the biennial election to 11 seats in the Maharashtra Legislative Council, which will be held on Friday. Samajwadi Party MLC Rais Shaikh has expressed concern over the situation and cautioned the Maha Vikas Aghadi that it will lose Muslim votes to the Asaduddin Owaisi-led All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM).
In a letter addressed to the leaders of MVA, which includes Congress, Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) and NCP (Sharad Pawar), the SP legislator said, “11 members of the Council are retiring on July 27. But none of the MVA constituents has fielded a Muslim candidate to fill the vacant posts. The MVA must rectify this mistake by giving adequate representation to the Muslim community in the Assembly polls.
” There are 12 candidates in the fray for the 11 legislative council vacancies. The MLCs were elected by the MLAs. Shiv Sena (UBT) filed the nomination of Milind Narvekar, a close aide of Uddhav Thackeray.
Congress has fielded Pradnya Satav, while the NCP (SP) has supported Peasants and Workers Party (PWP) chief Jayant Patil. The BJP has nominated Pankaja Munde, who recently lost the Lok Sabha election, Amit Gorkhe, Sadabhau Khot, Yogesh Tilekar and Parinay Phuke. Eknath Shinde’s.