Twenty-four hours after counting began for five Maharashtra legislative council seats for which polling was held on October 23, the ruling Mahayuti alliance on Wednesday morning is leading in three constituencies, and the opposition Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) is ahead in two.
Of the five seats that went to the polls, the BJP leads in the Pune teachers’ and Nagpur graduates constituencies, while the Shiv Sena leads in the Amravati teachers constituency. The Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar) leads in Pune graduates and Aurangabad graduates constituencies. In Nagpur graduates’ constituency, BJP candidate Sudhakar Kohale overtook his Congress rival, Abhijit Wanjari, who was leading the first round. In Pune teachers’ constituency, BJP’s Kaustubh Gawade was leading against sitting MLC and Congress candidate Jayant Ajgaonkar. Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena had supported rebel candidate Sachin Sanap against BJP’s Gawade in the same constituency, but Sanap was also trailing in early trends.
But as counting progressed, Kohale secured 60,921 votes at 8am. He led Wanjari by over 4,000 votes, with Wanjari in second place with 56,630 votes and independent candidate Nitesh Karale with 24,249 votes. In the Amravati teachers’ constituency, Shiv Sena candidate Kiran Sarnaik polled 8,575 votes and is ahead of the Congress’s Aditi Pohare by 4,752 votes despite the presence of Shiv Sena rebel candidate Shrikant Deshpande in the fray, who is currently third with 4,732 votes. An election officer said the final outcome in the five constituencies was expected to take at least 3-4 hours. Earlier reporting noted: Congress’ Abhijit Wanjari was ahead of BJP’s Sudhakar Kohale by 927 votes in Nagpur division graduates’ constituency after the first round of counting.
Earlier reporting noted: In the Teachers’ constituency, Gawade is contesting against sitting MLC and Congress candidate Dinkar Aasgaonkar and Shiv Sena-backed independent candidate Sachin Sanap. Earlier reporting noted: NCP (SP) candidate Harshada Deshmukh was leading against BJP’s Smita Jadhav from Pune graduates’ constituency.
