Fadnavis set to be Maharashtra CM; party meet soon: BJP leader

The name of Devendra Fadnavis has been finalised as the new chief minister of Maharashtra who will be elected as the legislature party leader in a meeting to be held either on December 2 or 3, a senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader said on Sunday night.

IMAGE: Maharashtra deputy chief minister. Photograph: ANI Photo

Earlier in the day, outgoing Chief Minister Eknath Shinde said he would support the BJP's decision to pick the new chief minister.

"The name of Devendra Fadnavis has been finalised as the new chief minister of Maharashtra. The meeting to elect the new BJP legislature party meeting will be held on either December 2 or 3," a senior BJP leader told PTI.

Amid speculation that his son Shrikant Shinde might get the deputy CM's post and Shiv Sena is keen on the Home portfolio, Eknath Shinde said the Mahayuti allies -- the BJP, the Nationalist Congress Party, and the Shiv Sena -- will decide the government formation through consensus after sitting together.

More than a week after the Mahayuti clinched a massive victory in Maharashtra polls with the BJP emerging as the single largest party with 132 seats, the new government is yet to be sworn in.

The oath-taking ceremony of the new Mahayuti government is scheduled for December 5 evening at the Azad Maidan in south Mumbai and Prime Minister Narendra Modi will attend it.

The BJP is moving cautiously as aspirations of its allies, especially Shiv Sena, grew after the massive poll victory.

Despite Shinde's insistence on Mahayuti unity, some leaders of allies spoke in different voices.

Former Union minister and BJP leader Raosaheb Danve said if the undivided Sena and BJP had contested the elections together, they would have won more seats.

Separately, Shiv Sena MLA Gulabrao Patil claimed that the Eknath Shinde-led party would have won 90-100 seats in polls had Ajit Pawar's NCP not been part of the alliance, drawing a sharp reaction from the Ajit Pawar-led party.

The BJP legislature party meeting to elect the leader, who will be the party's chief ministerial pick, is yet to be held even though Shiv Sena and NCP have elected Eknath Shinde and Ajit Pawar as their legislature party leaders, respectively.

A senior Mahayuti leader said the allies will jointly decide whether only the chief minister and deputy CMs will take oath on December 5 or ministers will also be sworn in.

Shinde had left for his native village in Satara district on Friday amid speculation that he was not happy with the way the new government was shaping up. He developed a high fever in his village.

Talking to reporters in his village on Sunday before leaving for Mumbai, Shinde said, "I have already said the decision on CM's post taken by the BJP leadership will be acceptable to me and Shiv Sena and will have my full backing."

"A meeting took place in Delhi last week with (Union home minister) Amit Shah, and now we three alliance partners will discuss the nitty-gritty of government formation after sitting together," he said.

Responding to a query on his health, the Shiv Sena leader said he was fine now and had come to his native village to get some rest.

Shinde reiterated that there are no differences among Mahayuti allies and pointed out that the BJP is yet to announce its legislature party leader.

"There are no ifs and buts. My health is fine now. The work of our government will be written in golden words in the history,' he said.

Shinde landed in Thane on the late Sunday afternoon.

Though the oath-taking ceremony of the new government just four days away, there seems no clarity on the schedule of the much-awaited BJP legislature party meeting.

A BJP leader claimed the party's MLAs have not been informed yet regarding the timing of the legislature party meeting. A day earlier, BJP leaders confirmed that the meeting will be held on December 2.

Maharashtra NCP chief Sunil Tatkare said, "We will sit together and decide whether only chief minister and deputy chief ministers will take oath or ministers will also be sworn in."

Differences among Mahayuti allies, meanwhile, came out in the open on Sunday.

"Had Shiv Sena not split into two, and contested assembly elections with the BJP, our victory would have been bigger than what we achieved today. We had also won comfortably in the 2019 assembly elections," Danve said.

He claimed the Shiv Sena split because of Sanjay Raut, a close aide of Uddhav Thackeray.

"You wait for six months, and Raut will cause a rift between Uddhav and his son Aaditya as well," he added.

Separately, Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Gaikwad, who won the Buldana constituency by a wafer-thin margin against Shiv Sena-UBT nominee Jayashree Shelke, levelled serious allegations.

"Local MP and Union minister Prataprao Jadhav of Shiv Sena called Shiv Sena (UBT) leader and confidante of Uddhav Thackeray to field Jayashree Shelke. BJP's Sanjay Kute passed on the same message to Sena (UBT) leader Anil Parab to field Shelke against me," he claimed.

The Mahayuti won 230 of the 288 assembly seats. The BJP led with 132 seats, while the Shiv Sena got 57 and NCP 41.

"We contested only 85 seats. Without Ajitdada, we could have won 90-100 seats. Shinde never asked why Ajit Pawar-led NCP was inducted in his government," Gulabrao Patil, a minister in the outgoing government, told a regional news channel.

NCP spokesperson Amol Mitkari hit back, asking Patil to not shoot off his 'loose tongue'.