Chandrakant Patil alleges vote theft by Satej Patil in Gokul dairy polls, offers to contest against him

As Congress leader Rahul Gandhi corners the government over SIR and vote theft, an allegation of vote theft has now surfaced in the Gokul election as well. This time the ruling side has levelled it at the Opposition. Minister Chandrakant Patil says Satej Patil won 13 directors through vote theft.

Chandrakant Patil also said that if Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis gives the order, he will contest against Satej Patil from any seat in Kolhapur and defeat him. He issued the challenge openly.

According to him, what was stolen were the resolutions held by the Mahayuti. To explain his point, Chandrakant Patil laid out the numbers. The director of the recognised dairy in each village has to give one resolution. For the Gokul election, 5,400 resolutions were finalised. Of these, 4,400 were in favour of the Mahayuti and 900 in favour of Satej Patil.

Chandrakant Patil said there were disputes over dominance in some places within the Mahayuti. This internal rift was exploited, and propaganda to the same effect was also run. As a result, the Mahayuti's tally fell from 4,400 straight to 2,700 to 2,800. Chandrakant Patil claims that this means Satej Patil stole his votes.

After having to sit on the Opposition benches in the Gokul election, MLA Satej Patil has now come forward with a new issue. Two days ago he warned that the tehsils left out of Kolhapur's drought list must be included, or a sharp agitation would be launched.

Congress leader and MLA Satej Patil demands that the remaining tehsils of Kolhapur district be added immediately to the state's list of drought-hit tehsils. He also demands that farmers be given a full crop loan waiver instead of loan restructuring. He said that if the state government did not decide on this at once, the agitation would intensify and he himself would take to the streets shoulder to shoulder with the farmers.

Satej Patil gave the warning in Gadhinglaj. The Drought Struggle Committee had called an all-party march and agitation there, and he took part in it. An agitation has been under way for the past few days demanding that Gadhinglaj tehsil be included in the drought list immediately.

On Thursday, a march led by the struggle committee set out from the town. When it reached Dussehra Chowk near the statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, the protesters sat down on the road in a sit-in. Satej Patil was part of the agitation.