NCP (AP) office-bearers demand one Legislative Council seat for Pune

Pune: Elections for 11 seats of the State Legislative Council have been announced. Office-bearers of the NCP (AP) have demanded one seat for the party.

A delegation of the City Unit of the party met DyCM Ajit Pawar in Mumbai and submitted a written demand for a State Legislative seat. They argued that at least one Legislative Council seat is needed to form an effective strategy for the Legislative Assembly elections.

The delegation was led by NCP (AP) City Unit President Deepak Mankar. There are 21 assembly seats in Pune district. Of them nine seats are with the Sharad Pawar faction. However, in many segments, the opponent got the lead in the Lok Sabha elections. In fact, this was reflected on Ajit Pawar’s home turf, Baramati. The same applies to the Shirur segment too. Workers said that the BJP candidates were at the second place in the last state polls in the city. Therefore, it may create hurdles during the seat-sharing talks.

Local office-bearers are insisting that the party should get at least one seat out of 11. One party MLC from Pune is needed from the political point of view. It will help during the assembly poll seat-sharing talks, said an office-bearer, who was a part of the delegation.

The BJP is likely to demand more seats in Pune on the basis of its candidate’s victory in the Lok Sabha. Therefore, it is prudent to get a Legislative Council seat before any such thing happens, said an office-bearer.

QUOTE

“It is true that we met DyCM Ajit Pawar and demanded a Legislative Council seat. We will accept the decision taken by him. However, we wanted to convey the stance of office-bearers and workers to him. It should not happen that demand was not made at all. Therefore, we met Pawar.”

• Deepak Mankar, President, City Unit, NCP (AP)