NEW DELHI: The latest political developments in Maharashtra leading to the swearing in of nine ministers from the NCP faction led by Ajit Pawar have brought the spotlight back on the role of Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar whose actions are likely to come under scanner.
Though Narwekar on Monday said he was unaware of the exact number of MLAs supporting the Ajit Pawar faction, the ball has already landed in his court with the NCP’s Sharad Pawar faction invoking the anti-defection law to seek disqualification of the nine MLAs who took oath as ministers on Sunday.
Before the split, the NCP had 53 MLAs in the 288-member House and the Ajit Pawar faction has claimed the support of 40 of them.
Within hours of Ajit Pawar’s resignation as the Leader of Opposition and his joining hands with the BJP-Shiv Sena, Maharashtra NCP president Jayant Patil appointed MLA Jitendra Awhad as the Leader of the Opposition and the NCP’s Chief Whip.
While dealing with issues arising out of the 2022 political crisis in Maharashtra leading to the installation of the Shiv Sena-BJP government led by Eknath Shinde on June 30, 2022, a five-judge Constitution Bench led by CJI DY Chandrachud had on May 11 said the whip can be appointed only by the political party and not the legislature party.
It had said the Speaker’s decision to appoint Bharat Gogawale of the Shinde faction as the whip of Shiv Sena was illegal.
“To hold that the legislature party appoints the whip will be like to sever the umbilical cord…this is not the system as envisaged by the Constitution. 10th schedule will be rendered otiose,” the Constitution Bench had said.
The second issue is about control over the party which will be decided by the Election Commission.
In the case of Shiv Sena, the Election Commission on February 17, 2023 declared the Shinde faction as the real Shiv Sena and allotted it the party’s “bow and arrow” symbol, saying the Shinde faction MLAs had got nearly 76% of the votes polled for the 55 winning Shiv Sena candidates in the 2019 Assembly Elections, while the Uddhav Thackeray faction got barely 23.5% of votes.
It all depends upon the number of MLAs who support Ajit Pawar in his quest for control over the party.