Maha MLC polls: All 5 BJP nominees, two each from Sena & NCP win; Cong gets one seat

MLC elections: BJP's Ram Shinde, Uma Khapre, Shrikant Bhartiya and Pravin Darekar won along with NCP leaders Eknath Khadse and Ramraje Naik Nimbalkar. Shiv Sena candidates Amshya Padvi and Sachin Ahir were also declared winners.

Two leaders each from the Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and five candidates of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were declared winners in the Maharashtra Legislative Council election that was held on Monday. The Congress got one seat in the polls.

BJP's Ram Shinde, Uma Khapre, Shrikant Bhartiya, Prasad Lad and Pravin Darekar won along with NCP leaders Eknath Khadse and Ramraje Naik Nimbalkar. Shiv Sena candidates Amshya Padvi and Sachin Ahir were also named winners. Bhai Jagtap of the Congress won in the second round of counting, said officials.

Earlier, the returning officer for the MLC elections invalidated two votes - one each of the ruling ally NCP and the opposition BJP - after objections were raised by leaders of the respective parties, an official said. 

The objections and invalidation of votes led to the suspension of counting process by almost half an hour, he said. The counting, originally scheduled to start at 5pm, was delayed by over two hours after the Congress raised an objection to the votes cast by BJP MLAs Mukta Tilak and Laxman Jagtap. 

The ailing opposition legislators had cast their votes with the help of assistants, which was objected to by the Congress, a key constituent of the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA). 

However, the Election Commission of India (ECI) rejected the Congress objection and gave a go ahead to counting of votes. Later, a BJP leader raised an objection to a ballot that had the first preference vote to NCP candidate Ramraje Nimbalkar. Similarly, an objection came from the NCP against a ballot paper having first preference vote to BJP nominee Uma Khapre, the official said. 

The returning officer at the Maharashtra Vidhan Bhavan in south Mumbai assessed the objections and declared both the ballot papers as invalid, he said. 

With this, the total number of valid votes came down to 283 (actual strength of the Assembly is 288, of which 285 MLAs were eligible to take part in polling as one seat is vacant, while two jailed members were barred from taking part in the process). 

In all, 11 candidates were in the fray - five of the BJP and two each of the Maha Vikas Aghadi allies, the Shiv Sena, the NCP and the Congress.

(With inputs from Mumbai bureau and agencies)