Nagpur/Mumbai
A little over a week after BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis took oath as Maharashtra’s Chief Minister along with Shiv Sena’s Eknath Shinde and NCP’s Ajit Pawar as the two Deputy Chief Ministers, the expansion of their Council of Ministers took place in Nagpur on Sunday (December 15).
The BJP has been allocated 19 ministerial berths while the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena got 11 departments and the Nationalist Congress Party headed by Ajit Pawar garnered nine, taking the total Ministerial berths to 42. Maharashtra can have a maximum of 43 members, including the Chief Minister. It means, just one vacancy remains for the future.
Of the six Minister of State (MoS) berths, the BJP has three, the Shiv Sena two and the NCP one. This apart, four women MLAs, including two as Cabinet Ministers, were appointed. As many as 21 women were elected to the 288 seat Maharashtra Assembly this year — with only one of them from the opposition. The BJP led the way with 14 women MLAs.
Maharashtra Governor CP Radhakrishnan administered the oath to the new ministers at the Raj Bhavan in Nagpur. In doing so, a unique record was created: It was after a gap of 33 years that a swearing-in ceremony of Ministers was held in Maharashtra’s second capital Nagpur. Such an event was last held in the city in 1991 when the then Chief Minister Sudhakarrao Naik expanded his Cabinet.
Naik had expanded his council of ministers by inducting Shiv Sena rebels Chhagan Bhujbal and Rajendra Gole, who had switched over to the ruling Congress. The Congress’ Beed legislator Jaidutt Kshirsagar was also inducted into the Naik government at the time. They were administered the oath of office by Governor C Subramanium. Naik was CM from June 25, 1991 to February 22, 1993.
Incidentally, while Chhagan Bhujbal still continues to be a force in the power corridors of Maharashtra, now being with the NCP, headed by Ajit Pawar, he did not find a place in the Mahayuti dispensation.
The Mahayuti had swept the State polls, results of which were declared on November 23, winning 235 of the total 288 Assembly seats. The BJP emerged as the single-largest party with 132 seats, while Shiv Sena won 57 and NCP secured 41 seats. The Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) alliance faced a major setback, with Shiv Sena (UBT) winning 20 seats, Congress bagging just 16 seats and the NCP (Sharad Pawar faction) claiming only 10 seats.
The Mahayuti also swept the tribal belts winning 22 of the total 25 ST reserved seats with the BJP winning 10 of them and its allies Shiv Sena and NCP bagging six seats apiece.
Among the two tribal Ministers who were sworn-in today is NCP’s Narhari Jhirwal, who was the Deputy Speaker of Maharashtra Assembly in its previous term. Jhirwal, a four-time MLA from the Dindori ST Assembly seat, had created a flutter in October when he alongwith some other tribal MLAs cutting across party lines and a BJP MP jumped from the third floor of the Maharashtra Mantralaya onto the safety net, protesting against any move to grant ST status to the Dhangar community which has been demanding it.
At present, the Dhangar community is part of the Nomadic Tribes (NT) category under which they are getting reservation benefits in government jobs and education of upto 3.5%. Inclusion in the ST category will increase their reservation quota to 7%.
The other Adivasi MLA to be sworn-in as Minister today is 60-year-old Ashok Uike, a tribal leader who is now into his third term as MLA from Ralegaon. He was Minister of Tribal Development in the Fadnavis cabinet in 2019.
Prominent among those sworn-in were BJP state chief Chandrashekhar Bawankule besides party’s Ashish Shelar, Girish Mahajan, Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil, Chandrakant Patil, Ganesh Naik, Pankaja Munde, Shiv Sena’s Gulab Rao Patil, Sanjay Shirsat, and NCP’s leader Hasan Mushrif and Dhanajay Munde.
Later, Fadnavis told reporters that the allocation of portfolios will be done after two days.
