Mooting the need for all opposition parties to unite against the ruling BJP- Shiv Sena in the assembly elections, former MP and farmer leader Raju Shetti said he was working on launching a public movement against the use of electronic voting machines (EVMs) in collaboration with Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray. "We are trying to ensure that all political forces, be it the Congress, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), MNS and Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) and the Left must join hands," said Shetti, a two-term MP (2009 and 2014) from Hatkanangale, who faced defeat from his constituency located in western Maharashtra to Shiv Sena's Dhairyasheel Mane. Shetti, who was elected to the Maharashtra assembly from the Shirol constituency in Kolhapur in 2004, has led protests by sugarcane farmers and milk producers for remunerative pricing of their produce, and heads the Swabhimaani Shetkari Sanghatana and its political arm, the Swabhimaani Paksha. "We are ready to contest between 50 to 60 seats on our own. However, we will decide our stance based on how things move forth with the alliance," said Shetti. He added that while there were fears that the Congress would lose out on a chunk of the north Indian vote if the MNS entered into a grand alliance of opposition parties, the "north Indian vote had already deviated from the Congress and it had little to lose in the present circumstances." Shetti, who attributed his defeat to factors like the use of EVMs, said in his recent meeting with MNS chief Raj Thackeray, he had discussed the possibility of approaching the courts or launching a public movement against the use of EVMs. Raj had met Election Commission of India (ECI) officials in New Delhi to seek that elections be conducted through the use of ballot papers rather than EVMs considering the possibility that they could be hacked and the need to maintain the sanctity of the electoral process. Shetti split from his mentor in 2004 over his decision to ally with the BJP. He later joined hands with the Congress and NCP, with whose sugar baron leaders, he had once fought street battles during protests to seek remunerative pricing for sugarcane.

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