Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde tendered his resignation as the term of the current Maharashtra Assembly expired on Tuesday, amid efforts to persuade him to accept BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis as the Mahayuti’s chief ministerial face.
BJP insiders said their party was firm on getting the chief minister’s post and they were confident Shinde would soon drop his resistance and accept the inevitable.
“Eknath Shinde has very little option but to accept that the BJP deserves the CM’s post this time. Bargaining for ministerial portfolios is on and soon the new government will be sworn in,” a central BJP leader said.
Shinde, too, sought not to annoy the BJP. In a post on X, he urged his supporters not to congregate in Mumbai. The congregation of his supporters was seen as an effort to put pressure on the BJP to make him the chief minister.
The BJP has won 132 seats and secured the backing of 41 members of the Ajit Pawar faction of the NCP for Fadnavis as chief minister, limiting the resisting power of Shinde who has 57 seats. The majority mark in the 288-member Maharashtra Assembly is 145.
Amid the simmering tension within, the Mahayuti partners sought to display amity as Shinde was accompanied by his two current deputies, Fadnavis and Ajit, to tender their resignation to the governor.
Governor C.P. Radhakrishnan asked Shinde to continue as the caretaker chief minister till the new government is sworn in.
The BJP has offered Shinde and Ajit the post of deputy chief minister. Shinde's resistance, some BJP leaders claimed, was aimed at extracting plum portfolios as a bargain for amicably accepting to drop his claim to the chief minister's post. Sources in Shinde's Sena said they were also being offered ministerial portfolios in the Modi government at the Centre but were insistent on extracting a bigger share in the Maharashtra power pie.
"CM Shinde has clearly said that whatever decision PM Modi and home minister Amit Shah take, it will be acceptable to him," Deepak Kesarkar, a minister in the outgoing government and a Shinde Sena leader, told reporters in Mumbai.
The BJP's lunge for the chief minister's post, however, could plant the seeds of discord in the Mahayuti as indicated by Dalit leader and Union minister Ramdas Athawale, whose Republican Party of India is a Mahayuti constituent.
"The BJP high command has decided that Devendra Fadnavis should be made the chief minister but Eknath Shinde is unhappy and his displeasure needs to be removed…," Athawale told reporters.
Athawale also urged Shinde to back down and accept Fadnavis as the chief minister, given that the verdict was tilted heavily in favour of the BJP.
Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) leaders tried to cash in on the discord over the chief minister's post in the ruling side. Sanjay Raut, the leader of the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena, dubbed the leaders of the two Maharashtra-based parties "slaves of Modi-Shah's BJP".
"PM Modi and home minister Amit Shah will decide the Maharashtra chief minister. Eknath Shinde and Ajit Pawar cannot make decisions for their parties on their own. These two parties are slaves of Shah and Modi and are sub-companies of the BJP," Raut told reporters.
He accused the BJP of plotting to restrict the seat tally of the two parties to stop them from claiming the chief minister's post.
The Shinde faction has been using a similar plea to urge the BJP to allow their leader to continue as the chief minister. "The Uddhav Sena will play on Marathi sentiments and accuse the BJP of using and then throwing out the Shiv Sena. This could harm the Mahayuti in the future," a Shinde Sena leader said.
