Ahead of the Maharashtra Assembly elections, veteran leader Sharad Pawar led faction moved the Supreme Court on Friday seeking that both factions of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) be given new poll symbols.
A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Ujjal Bhuyan listed the plea for hearing on September 25 after senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, appearing for Sharad Pawar faction submitted that they want urgent listing of the matter in view of the assembly elections in Maharashtra.
Mr Singhvi said that till the matter is finally decided, both the groups should be given new symbols ahead of the Maharashtra Assembly elections.
Sharad Pawar has moved the Supreme Court against the February 6 order of the Election Commission recognising Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar-led group as the real Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).
The Election Commission (EC) has also allotted the NCP symbol ‘clock’ to the group led by Ajit Pawar. The NCP, founded by Sharad Pawar, had ‘clock’ as its election symbol before its split.
On March 19, the top court allowed the Sharad Pawar faction to use ‘Nationalist Congress Party-Sharadchandra Pawar’ as its name along with the symbol of ‘Man blowing Turha’ ahead of the Lok Sabha polls in the country.
It had passed the order on a plea by the Sharad Pawar group seeking to restrain the Ajit Pawar faction from using the ‘clock’ symbol for the polls, as allotted by the Election Commission, on the ground that it is disrupting the level playing field. The top court had earlier observed that the name and photographs of Sharad Pawar cannot be used by the Ajit Pawar faction for political gains.
The top court had on February 19 directed that the Election Commission’s order allotting ‘Nationalist Congress Party-Sharadchandra Pawar’ as the party name for the Sharad Pawar faction will continue till further orders.
Maharashtra Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar had on February 15 held that the NCP faction led by Ajit Pawar was the real NCP and that the anti-defection provisions in the Constitution cannot be used to stifle internal dissent.
Sharad Pawar had founded the NCP with former Lok Sabha speaker Purno Sangma and Tariq Anwar in 1999 after their expulsion from the Congress.
Ajit Pawar had walked away with a majority of the NCP MLAs in July last year and supported the BJP-Shiv Sena government led by Eknath Shinde.
