Bhosale to contest Council elections

MUMBAI, OCT 24: The latest to confirm candidature for the forthcoming Maharashtra Legislative Council elections is Maharashtra Pradesh Co...

MUMBAI, OCT 24: The latest to confirm candidature for the forthcoming Maharashtra Legislative Council elections is Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) president Pratap Bhosale.

Elections for the six seats of the Legislative Council are scheduled for November 13 and Bhosale has decided to contest the polls from Satara-Sangli local self government constituency.

Incidentally, Bhosale had just last week squashed “all rumours that he wanted to become a member of the State Legislature”.

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Members of the Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Selection Committee held a meeting on Friday at the Tilak Bhavan which was chaired by Bhosale himself. The MPCC chief was so eager to announce his participation in the polls that he left for New Delhi, accompanied by his confidant and MPCC general secretary Kripashankar Singh, soon after the meeting concluded.

Meanwhile, the selection committee has prepared a list of probables for the MLC elections which will be approved by All India Congress Committee (AICC) presidentSonia Gandhi and senior Congress leader Sharad Pawar.

Apart from including Bhosale’s name to the poll list, the selection committee has also decided on candidates from different parts of the State.

Ashok Chavan, son of senior Congress leader Shankarrao Chavan has been selected for the Nanded local self government constituency. Ironically, in the last Legislative Council elections, Ashok Chavan was denied ticket by the selection committee and instead Ramjit Deshmukh was selected to fight from the same constituency.

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The Committee has named Dr Nasiruddin Irani for Yavatmal, J T Mahajan for Jalgaon and Gopaldas Agrawal for Bhandara local self government constituencies but failed to propose a candidate for Pune local self government constituency. The reason being the tussle between sitting MLC prof Ramkrishna More and MPCC vice-president Ulhas Pawar for the ticket. While More is supposed to be close to Sharad Pawar, Ulhas Pawar is known to be a Bhosale man. The selection committee has decided to name thecandidate only after talking to Sharad Pawar.