Bajaj likely to sail through to RS, but Rane may cut the entourage to size

MUMBAI: Rahul Bajaj, the Bajaj Auto chairman, is likely to be easily elected to the Rajya Sabha (RS) on Thursday, though a small band of Shiv Sena MLAs, spurred by Narayan Rane, may vote against him.

Thursday’s election to fill the RS vacancy created by Pramod Mahajan’s untimely death is now just a formality since three major parties, NCP, Shiv Sena and the BJP are supporting his candidature and the Congress is left alone to fight its battle. However, what remains to be seen is how much support Mr Bajaj pulls up to make it to Delhi.

Mr Bajaj may see his ‘vote base’ shrinking for a couple of reasons. Dalits have criticised Mr Bajaj’s position on the reservation issue and have asked fellow MLAs not to vote for Mr Bajaj. Mr Bajaj is a known vocal opponent of introducing reservation in the private sector.

Another factor that may affect his result is an effort by Narayan Rane to snatch a few votes from his former party, the Shiv Sena. Since he quit the Sena July last, Mr Rane has not missed a single opportunity to undermine the Sena leadership. As a part of his ongoing feud with Sena working president Uddhav Thackeray, Mr Rane recently engineered a split in Sena votes that resulted in Congress winning the legislative council polls.

The election saw the Sena losing as many as 20 votes to Congress. Before this, he had four Sena MLAs resigning from the party to join him in the Congress. The next episode of this battle is expected to be played in Thursday’s RS election. The battle wary Sena has already approached the assembly speaker Babasaheb Kupekar demanding disqualification of Rane’s MLAs.

Mr Rane, however, is likely to have the last laugh as he is confident of receiving at least five to six votes from the Sena. This may result in Congress candidate Avinash Pande’s support swelling to 80. It’s, however, almost unlikely to change the course of events as Mr Bajaj is way ahead of the Congress nominee, Mr Pande.

The strength of the state assembly is 289, including a nominated member of the Anglo-Indian community. The Congress has 73 members, NCP 71, Shiv Sena 58, BJP 54, Jansurajya party 4, CPM 3, PWP 2, BRP Mahasangh 1, RPI-A 1, Swatantra Bharat Party 1, Akhil Bharatiya Sena 1 along with 19 Independents.

Of these, 183 members belonging to Shiv Sena, BJP and the NCP have supported Mr Bajaj’s candidature as against 73 of the Congress.