Mumbai: Top leaders of Maha Vikas Aghadi, including Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray, NCP (SP) head Sharad Pawar along with Maharashtra Navnirman Sena president Raj Thackeray, will lead the Opposition’s November 1 protest march in Mumbai against alleged irregularities in voters’ lists.
The Thackeray cousins, warming up to each other after years of political estrangement, and Pawar held a meeting at the YB Chavan here on Thursday to finalise the nitty-gritty of the grand joint rally, where senior Congress leader Naseem Khan, Peasants and Workers Party (PWP)’s Jayant Patil, and leaders of Left parties were also present.
State Congress president Harshwardhan Sapkal, whose outfit is a key constituent of the Opposition MVA, noted his party completely supports the agitation, but remained non-committal on himself taking part in the march, arguing “individual leaders are not important”.
Talking to reporters after the meeting, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Anil Parab said the protest march, coming ahead of local body polls in Maharashtra, will be taken out from the Fashion Street in south Mumbai to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) headquarters.
The protest march, covering a distance of around 1.5km, will be held between 1 pm and 4 pm and citizens will not be inconvenienced in any way by the stir, the former state minister insisted.
The entire Opposition leadership in the state, including Sharad Pawar, Uddhav and Raj Thackery, will participate in the march. It will be held in a peaceful manner, and issues like “vote theft” and irregularities in voter lists will be highlighted, the Sena (UBT) MLC said.
The Raj Thackery-led MNS is not yet part of the MVA, which consists of the Congress, NCP (SP) and Shiv Sena (UBT).
The Maharashtra State Election Commission (SEC) has clarified there was no provision in laws or rules governing local body elections for the use of Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) machines.
Referring to it, Parab said the Opposition was studying the SEC’s statement.
State Congress spokesperson Sachin Sawant said the SEC’s argument was not tenable because VVPAT testing was done in one ward of the Nanded Waghala City Municipal Corporation during its elections in 2017. There is no basis for this argument, he said.