Rahul Narwekar: Maharashtra Speaker Looks To Retain Colaba Seat (image:x.com/rahulnarwekar)

Rahul Narwekar serves as the Speaker of the Maharashtra legislative assembly. He took over the post on July 3, 2022. Narwekar is a first-time BJP legislator, and in the upcoming Maharashtra polls, he is seeking his second term from Mumbai’s Colaba assembly segment.

Also Read | Sudhir Mungantiwar: BJP Heavyweight Eyeing Seventh Win

An advocate by profession, Narwekar started his political career with Shiv Sena. He emerged as a prominent youth face in the party, especially as the party’s face on television channel debates and discussions  and as a close associate of Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Aaditya Thackeray. However, ahead of the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, he quit the Sena and joined the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). He unsuccessfully contested the Maval parliamentary seat on the NCP ticket but subsequently contented with a Legislative Council seat.

In 2019, just before the Assembly polls, he joined the BJP in another surprise move. The party fielded him from Colaba by neglecting then sitting MP and party loyalist Raj K Purohit. Naewekar won the seat by defeating Congress candidate Ashok Jagtap with a margin of 16,195 votes. When he got elected as the Speaker, he became one of the youngest members to get selected for the position.

Also Read | Mangal Prabhat Lodha: To Solidify His Position In Malabar Hill

Narwekar hails from an influential political family that has exercised significant roles in the local administration in Mumbai’s Colaba areas, the Indian Express reports. His father, Suresh Narwekar, was a Municipal Councillor from the Colaba area, and his brother, Makarand Narwekar, is a second-term Municipal Councillor. Besides, Narwekar’s father-in-law, Ramraje Naik Nimbalkar, is a senior NCP leader and former Legislative Council chairman.

The 288 Assembly seats in Maharashtra will go to polls on November 20. The Maharashtra Assembly elections mark the first after the Shiv Sena and NCP parties split in June 2022 and July 2023, respectively.