With several prominent candidates in the fray, including rebels from both alliances, preferential votes were expected to play a crucial role, delaying the final results until after midnight on Tuesday. Preliminary trends in the counting of votes for five Maharashtra Legislative Council seats showed the ruling Mahayuti alliance leading in three constituencies, while the opposition Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) was ahead in two.
In the Aurangabad Graduates’ constituency, Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar) candidate Pratapsinh Patil was leading Mahayuti candidate and sitting MLC Satish Chavan by around 4,000 votes after approximately 35,000 votes had been counted. In the Nagpur Graduates’ constituency, BJP candidate Sudhakar Kohale was leading Congress candidate Abhijit Vanjari by around 4,000 votes after the first round of counting. In the Amravati Teachers’ constituency, Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena candidate Kiran Sarnaik was leading after around 14,000 votes had been counted.
The Mahayuti was leading in the Pune and Amravati Teachers’ constituencies and the Nagpur Graduates’ constituency. The MVA was ahead in the Pune and Aurangabad Graduates’ constituencies. In the Pune Teachers’ constituency, BJP candidate Kaustubh Gawade was leading, followed by Shiv Sena-backed candidate Sachin Sanap and independent candidate Dattatray Sawant. Sitting MLC and Congress candidate Jayant Asgaonkar was trailing in fourth place. The Pune Graduates’ constituency witnessed a close contest between MVA candidate Harshada Deshmukh-Jadhav and Mahayuti candidate Dr Smita Jadhav. Preliminary trends showed Deshmukh-Jadhav marginally ahead of her rival. Thackeray-led Shiv Sena candidate Dilip Ghuge was also in contention. Independent candidate Nitesh Karale was in third place, with a relatively narrow gap separating the three candidates. Rebel Shiv Sena leader and former MLC Shrikant Deshpande was ahead of Congress candidate Aditi Pohare, who was trailing.
