New Delhi: Maharashtra Legislature Secretary Rajendra Bhagwat on Sunday issued show cause notices to 53 out of 55 Shiv Sena MLAs, out of which 39 belong to the faction of Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and 14 to Uddhav Thackeray group, news agency ANI reported. As per the report, all the MLAs are expected to respond within a week’s time. Bhagwat, as quoted by ANI said, “Whenever we get any application, we have to act on it. So, notices have been issued to each MLA against whom there was an application.”
On July 4, Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde won the floor test in the Assembly, on the last day of the two-day special session of the House. In the 288-member Assembly, 164 MLAs voted for the motion of confidence while 99 voted against it.
As per reports, three legislators abstained from voting while Congress’s Ashok Chavan and Vijay Wadettiwar were among those absent during trust vote.
Speaker Rahul Narvekar said the trust vote was carried by a majority. After the recent death of a Shiv Sena MLA, the current strength of the Assembly is reduced to 287, making majority mark 144.
As per the report, MLAs from both the sides have confirmed having received the show-cause notice. Notably, both Thackeray group and Shinde camp have accused each other of defying the party whip during the Speaker's election and the trust vote on 3 and 4 July respectively, seeking disqualification of the legislators from both the sides.
It is to be noted that after the Maharashtra government won the trust vote, Eknath Shinde faction on Monday gave a petition to Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar for the suspension of 16 MLAs of Uddhav Thackeray’s camp for violation of whip. Bharat Gogawale, Chief whip of Shiv Sena’s Eknath Shinde faction gave the petition to the Speaker.
Gogawale, as quoted by ANI said, “We have given the notice to disqualify all the persons who defied our whip except Aaditya Thackeray. We have not given the name of Aaditya Thackeray due to respect towards Balasaheb Thackeray.”