Maharashtra governor Bhagatsingh Koshyari continued to be the talking point in state politics on day one of the budget session on Monday. After the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government made him read some anti-Centre observations in his address to the joint session of the legislature, the state government attempted bartering with the Raj Bhavan through the opposition, to get its 12 representatives nominated to the upper house in exchange for renewing the governor-controlled statutory development boards for backward regions.

The relations between the government and the governor have been far from cordial, and of late, there has been unprecedented sparring. In the wake of this, the governor’s address to the joint session had become an event in itself when Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, who has stopped flying from the Raj Bhavan helipad after the governor was denied the state’s permission to fly a government aircraft, formally received Koshyari at the Vidhan Bhavan on Monday. The government’s rejection of Koshyari’s letter to the State Legislature asking to hold the Speaker’s election gave the opposition BJP another issue to be raised.