Mumbai: In a major setback to Maharashtra’s ruling alliance of Shiv Sena, Nationalist Congress Party and Congress, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday, June 11, won three of the six Rajya Sabha seats. The ruling combine questioned the eight-hour delay in counting of votes.The BJP winners include Union minister Piyush Goyal and former state minister Anil Bonde, and Dhananjay Mahadik.Shiv Sena’s Sanjay Raut, NCP’s Praful Patel and Congress’ Imran Pratapgarhi also won the fiercely-fought elections.Of the 284 valid votes, Goyal polled 48, Bonde 48, Mahadik 41.56, Raut 41, Pratapgarhi 44 and Patel 43.The contest was for the sixth seat for which the BJP had fielded former MP Dhananjay Mahadik and the Shiv Sena candidate was Sanjay Pawar, who lost. Mahadik and Pawar are both from Kolhapur in western Maharashtra.The high-stakes battle for the sixth seat turned out to be a nail-biting affair with the Congress and BJP trading charges and even approaching the Election Commission.“Elections are contested not just for the fight, but the victory. Jai Maharashtra,” tweeted BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis, whose refusal to have a consensus candidate for the Rajya Sabha led to elections in the state after 24 years.निवडणूक केवळ लढविण्यासाठी नाही,तर जिंकण्यासाठी लढविली होती…जय महाराष्ट्र ! #RajyaSabhaElections2022 #Maharashtra— Devendra Fadnavis (@Dev_Fadnavis) June 10, 2022The counting of votes started after an eight-hour delay amid complaints of cross voting and rules violation by the BJP and the ruling alliance.Both BJP and the Shiv Sena approached the Election Commission seeking disqualification of votes.The poll panel directed the Rajya Sabha election returning officer of Maharashtra to reject the vote cast by Shiv Sena legislator Suhas Kande, after which the counting of votes got underway after 1 am. The first result was out in two hours.Maharashtra Revenue Minister Balasaheb Thorat told reporters in Vidhan Bhavan that the results needed to be studied.“BJP was cunning in holding up the counting and getting one vote invalid. We were confident that all four of our candidates will win comfortably,” the Congress leader said.Imran Pratapgarhi, the victorious Congress candidate said he was happy with his win but the defeat of Shiv Sena candidate Sanjay Pawar was unfortunate.NCP leader Praful Patel said he will continue to make sure the concerns of Maharashtra are heard and addressed.I am deeply humbled by your support, and I want to assure you that I will continue to work day and night to make sure that your concerns and of my Maharashtra state are heard and addressed.#RajyaSabhaElections #RajyaSabhaElection2022— Praful Patel (@praful_patel) June 10, 2022 Raut blamed the poll panel for the defeat of the fourth MVA candidate.“Election Commission declared our one vote invalid. We objected to two votes but no action was taken on that demand. Election Commission favoured them (BJP),” Raut said.“I don’t think the BJP’s candidate has won. The first preference votes of 33 were secured by Pawar,” Raut said, adding that BJP’s Mahadik bagged 27 votes as first preference.“He won on the basis of the second preference vote,” Raut said.‘Not shocked,’ says Sharad Pawar“I am not shocked to see the results. If you see the votes polled by every candidate of (Maha Vikas Aghadi allies) NCP, Shiv Sena and Congress, they received the votes as per the quota. Only Praful Patel (of NCP) received one extra vote and I know from where it came. That was not MVA’s vote, it was from the opposite side,” Pawar told reporters here.He added that for the sixth seat, contested by Shiv Sena, there was a big gap, but MVA showed courage and put in efforts. BJP had more Independent MLAs on their side, but for both, BJP and MVA, the number of votes were not sufficient,” he said.One has to accept the miracle, in which BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis succeeded in weaning away independents and smaller parties who would have supported the MVA, Pawar added.“That is why this gap of votes was there,” he said.(With PTI inputs)