BJP's Rahul Narwekar elected as Maharashtra assembly speaker

MUMBAI: BJP's Rahul Narwekar was on Sunday elected the speaker of Maharashtra assembly. Narwekar bagged a majority 164 votes and defeated MVA candidate Rajan Salvi, who received 107.
The voting to elect the assembly speaker was held via head count.
Samajwadi Party abstained from voting against BJP candidate Narwekar. Both its MLAs Abu Azmi and Raees Shaikh remained seated during the head count. One AIMIM MLA abstained from voting, while another was absent from the session held on Sunday.
A total of three MLAs abstained from voting in the assembly including AIMIM's Shah Farukh Anwar, SP's two MLAs while one AIMIM MLA was absent from the House.
Rahul Narwekar, who comes from a political family, was with the Shiv Sena, which he quit when the party denied him a ticket for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. He shifted to NCP, contested from Maval and lost. Devendra Fadnavis gave him the BJP ticket for the Colaba constituency in 2019, denying party's old-timer Raj Purohit. He won the seat by defeating the Congress candidate by over 15,000 votes.
Narwekar on Sunday took charge amid chants of "Jai Bhavani, Jai Shivaji", "Jai Sri Ram", "Bharat Mata ki Jai" and "Vande Mataram".