The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday announced the names of three candidates, including a close aide of Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and a former MLA, for the March 27 byelections to five seats in the state legislative council.
The byelections have been necessitated due to the victory of the five sitting MLCs in the November 2024 assembly polls. Three of the MLCs who entered the assembly were from the BJP, followed by one each of the Shiv Sena and the NCP. All three parties are constituents of the ruling Mahayuti coalition in the state.
The BJP on Sunday announced the names of Sandip Diwakarrao Joshi, former mayor of Nagpur and a close aide of Fadnavis, Sanjay Kishanrao Kenekar, general secretary of the state BJP unit, and former MLA Dadarao Yadavrao Keche, for the council bypolls.
Keche won the 2009 and 2019 assembly elections from the Arvi constituency in the Wardha district of the Vidarbha region. He was denied a ticket for the 2024 polls as the BJP then fielded Fadnavis' former personal secretary Sumit Wankhede from the Arvi seat.
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The last day for filing nominations by candidates is March 17. The byelections of the MLCs are from the MLA quota in the 288-member legislative assembly. The BJP has 132 MLAs, Shiv Sena 57 and NCP 41, making them comfortably placed to win all five seats, given their dominating presence in the lower house.
The last date of scrutiny of nominations is March 18, while candidates can withdraw from the contest on March 20. If needed, voting will take place on March 27 with the MLAs forming the electoral college.