The Congress has begun its search for the new leader of opposition in the Maharashtra state legislature after Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil submitted his resignation from the post last month as his son had joined the Bharatiya Janata Party and was given ticket to contest Lok Sabha elections from Ahmednagar constituency. The newly elected leader of the Congress legislative party will also be Maharashtra's new leader of opposition.
AICC general secretary in-charge for Maharashtra, Mallikarjun Kharge held discussions with Congress legislators on Monday. The legislators have told Kharge that a senior and aggressive leader should be made the new leader of opposition as the state will go for assembly elections in October.
The names in the race include former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan and former revenue minister Balasaheb Thorat as both are the most senior among Congress legislators in Maharashtra. Both Chavan and Thorat belong to Congress families and are known to be staunch party loyalists. While Chavan has spent most of his political career in Delhi and came to Maharashtra as a chief minister in 2010, Thorat has been a minister and legislator for five terms. Thorat was minister in the Congress-NCP governments from 1999 to 2014 and held important portfolios like agriculture and revenue.
Another name doing rounds is that of Vijay Vadettiwar, a legislator from Vidarbha. Vaddettiwar had joined Congress along with Narayan Rane in 2005. Earlier, he was in Shiv Sena.
Some legislators are also learnt to have expressed a view that the party's leader of opposition should be a dalit as it would send a positive signal to the backward communities ahead of elections. Among Dalit legislators within the Congress, Varsha Gaikwad is seen as an aggressive voice in the state legislature. Being a woman will be an added advantage for her.
At Monday's meeting, Kharge spoke to each and every Congress legislator. After the discussions, a resolution was passed urging party president Rahul Gandhi to select the leader of Congress in state legislature.
