Mumbai, November 23: Hours after Devendra Fadnavis took oath as Maharashtra Chief Minister on Saturday, resort politics has started in the state. According to reports, the Shiv Sena is mulling to move its MLAs to Jaipur to thwart any poaching attempt. Similarly, Congress is also planning to lodge its MLAs to Bhopal. The development came after a faction of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) headed by Ajit Pawar extended support to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Ajit was sworn-in as Deputy Chief Minister of the state. Devendra Fadnavis After Taking Oath as CM Says Maharashtra Needed Stable Govt, Not 'Khichdi' Govt.
Meanwhile, Uddhav Thackeray will hold a meeting with his MLAs at Mumbai’s Lalit Hotel in Mumbai on Saturday to discuss future strategy. The NCP chief Sharad Pawar is also holding a meeting with MLAs of his party. Pawar is confident that major faction of his party MLAs are in favour of forming the alliance with Shiv Sena.
In a dramatic turnaround of events, Fadnavis took oath as the CM early this morning. The development came within hours after the Congress-NCP-Shiv Sena alliance was in final stages. However, till now there are reports that only 10 NCP MLAs including Ajit are flying to Delhi to meet senior BJP leaders. The saffron party claimed that it has a support of most of the NCP MLAs. Devendra Fadnavis Takes Oath as Maharashtra CM, Ajit Pawar Deputy CM.
After taking the oath, Fadnavis greeted BJP workers. He assured that the BJP and Ajit-led NCP would form a stable government in the state. Addressing the party supporters at the BJP office in Mumbai, Fadnavis thanked everyone for the support and said that "Modi ji hain to mumkin hai (If Modi is there, then all is possible).”
The BJP who emerged as the single largest party with 105 MLAs needs the support of at least 40 MLAs. Still, it is not clear how many NCP MLAs extended support to the BJP. Meanwhile, the combined number of MLAs of Congress, NCP and Shiv Sena till yesterday was 154.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Nov 23, 2019 05:39 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).