Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief and Maharashtra caretaker Dy CM Ajit Pawar on Saturday said during a meeting of Mahayuti leaders it was decided that the new chief minister will be from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the remaining two parties – Shiv Sena and NCP – will get Dy CM posts.
The meeting of Mahayuti leaders was held in Delhi.
Ajit Pawar said: “During the meeting (Delhi meeting of Mahayuti leader) it was decided that Mahayuti will form the government with CM from BJP and the remaining two parties will have Dy CMs… This is not the first time there has been a delay… If you remember, in 1999, one month was taken for government formation.”
This comes after reports on Friday suggested that Maharashtra’s caretaker Chief Minister Eknath Shinde was “upset” and had travelled to his native village amid the delay in forming the government.
Earlier, on Thursday night, Eknath Shinde, along with Devendra Fadnavis, NCP chief Ajit Pawar, and other Mahayuti leaders, met Union Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP national president JP Nadda in the national capital.
BJP’s Maharashtra president Chandrashekhar Bawankule on Saturday announced that the oath-taking ceremony of the Mahayuti government will be held on December 5.
The swearing-in ceremony will be held at around 5 pm on December 5 at Azad Maidan in Mumbai.
He added that the event will be conducted in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
In a post on social media platform X, Bawankule wrote, “Oath-taking ceremony of the Maha-Yuti Government in Maharashtra. It will be held in the presence of the pride of the world, Prime Minister Narendra Modi Ji on Thursday, December 5, 2024, at 5 PM at Azad Maidan, Mumbai.”
The Maharashtra Assembly election results were declared on November 23, with BJP-led Mahayuti alliance storming back to power with a landslide majority. The ruling alliance, however, is yet to finalise its Chief Minister face.
The BJP emerged as the largest party with 132 seats in the 280-member Maharashtra Assembly, while its allies–the Shiv Sena, led by Eknath Shinde, and the NCP, led by Ajit Pawar–won 57 and 41 seats, respectively.
