Wadettiwar Says ‘Traitor’ Congress MLAs have been Identified, will be Punished

Mumbai: Senior Congress leader Vijay Wadettiwar on Sunday revealed that the party MLAs, who have allegedly cross voted in the recent Vidhan Parishad polls, are from Mumbai and Nanded. A report has been sent to the party high command seeking action against them, he said.

“It has come to our notice that some MLAs were not with us during the Vidhan Parishad elections. We have identified the traitor MLAs who were involved in the cross voting. We have found out their names. Among them, some are from Nanded and some from Mumbai. Their names cannot be disclosed at this time,” Wadettiwar said.

The Congress was embarrassed for the second time in the legislative council elections where its five to seven MLAs suspected to have voted for the candidates fielded by the ruling Mahayuti alliance.

“We have a list of people who voted for us, who didn’t and who betrayed the party. While voting in the Vidhan Parishad polls, all MLAs were given a formula, according to which they had to vote. But some MLAs did not follow the party order and we have been successful in tracing their names,” Waddettiwar, who is the leader of opposition in the legislative assembly, said.

In the biennial elections in 2020 also, several Congress MLAs had cross-voted, resulting in Congress's first choice candidate Chandrakant Handore’s defeat. Then, the party had set up a probe panel under the leadership of former chief minister Pritviraj Chavan. The committee submitted its report recommending action against the MLAs defying party whip. However, the party did not take any action on the report.

However, Mr Wadettiwar said that the MLAs betraying the party will not be spared this time. “These traitors will surely be punished. Our party’s state president Nana Patole has sent a report on these MLAs to our party high command in Delhi. Party top leaders will definitely take action against them,” he said.

In the just concluded Vidhan Parishad elections, nearly seven Congress MLAs are believed to have cross voted resulting in the defeat of the third candidate of the opposition MVA alliance. There were 12 candidates in the fray for the 11 seats in the upper house of the state legislature.

All nine candidates of the ruling Mahayuti won. They include the BJP’s Pankaja Munde, Yogesh Tilekar, Parinay Phuke, Amit Gorkhe and Sadabhau Khot, Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena’s Krupal Tumane and Bhavana Gawali and Ajit Pawar-led NCP’s Rajesh Vitekar and Shivajirao Garje.

From the opposition MVA alliance, Pradnya Satav of the Congress and Milind Narvekar of Shiv Sena (UBT) emerged victorious. However, Jayant Patil from the Peasants and Workers Party (PWP), who was backed by NCP (SP), lost as several MLAs from the MVA camp cross-voted in favour of ruling party candidates.

Interestingly, Ms Satav was expected to receive 32 votes of MLAs, but she received only 25 votes.