New Delhi:
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) announced former Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis as its legislative party leader on Wednesday, a climactic move that effectively put him in charge of the state once again after days of suspense and tense negotiations between allies over government formation.
The BJP, Shiv Sena (Eknath Shinde faction) and the Nationalist Congress Party, or NCP (Ajit Pawar faction)—together called the Mahayuti—won a resounding mandate in assembly election results on November 23, but power-sharing talks in the alliance led to a delay in the naming of the CM pick.
On Wednesday, Fadnavis’s name was proposed as the BJP legislative party leader at a core committee meeting, a motion that was accepted and effectively made him the chief minister of the state. The oath-taking is expected to happen in Mumbai on December 5.
The BJP, which alone won 132 of the state’s 288 seats, wanted Fadnavis as the chief minister, a claim supported by the NCP, which won 41 seats. The Sena, with 57 seats, however maintained that it was Eknath Shinde who led the Mahayuti to the polls.
Tuesday night that Shinde, who took charge as the Chief Minister in mid-2022 after a political upheaval in the state, relented and accepted to take up a deputy role.
