The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) MLA Rahul Narwekar got elected with 164 votes as the new Speaker of Maharashtra Legislative Assembly here today while MVA-backed Shiv Sena candidate Rajan Salvi lost with 107 votes.
Narwekar took charge as the speaker of the Maharashtra assembly amid chants of “Jai Bhavani, Jai Shivaji”, “Jai Sri Ram”, and “Bharat Mata ki Jai” and “Vande Mataram”.
The Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on this tweeted the same congratulating Narwekar.
The elections were held by a division of votes on the first of the two-day Special Assembly Session ordered by Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari, last weekend.
On July 4, Chief Minister Eknath S. Shinde, supported by the BJP, will seek a ‘vote of confidence’ in the new government sworn in on June 30 after the collapse of the MVA government.
The Samajwadi Party and one AIMIM MLA abstained from voting while another AIMIM MLA was absent from the session held on Sunday.