A day after Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Agadhi cleared the Floor Test in Vidhan Bhawan, the election for the Speaker's post for Maharashtra Assembly will be held on Sunday. While the Congress nominated MLA Nana Patole as its candidate for the post, the BJP had named Kisan Kathore as their candidate. Patole represents the Sakoli Assembly segment in Vidarbha while Kathore is a MLA from Murbad in Thane district. They both are in their fourth term as MLAs.
Kathore was elected the Thane Zilla Parishad president in 2002. He became Thane MLA on an NCP ticket in 2004. He won in 2009, 2014 and 2019 Assembly Elections. He contested the last two elections on BJP ticket.
The Maha Vikas Agadhi (Shiv Sena, NCP, Congress) alliance cleared the floor test with a total of 169 MLAs out of 288 members despite oppositions' walkout.
105 MLAs of BJP staged walkout from Vidhan Bhawan on Saturday after raising several issues. Among these issues, BJP attacked the ruling coalition government for replacing protem speaker before the floor test. Kalidas Kolambkar of the BJP was replaced by senior NCP leader Dileep Valse Patil.
Devendra Fadnavis said that this act of the ruling government is against tradition and rules of the assembly as according to the constitution protem speaker can only be replaced after an election for the post.
Senior BJP leader Chandrakant Patil said, "This has never happened before in the country's history. The Speaker hasn't been chosen and the floor test is being conducted by a protem Speaker which is against the rules."
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