Uddhav Thackeray stakes claim to form govt, curtains for now

Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress combine's Chief Ministerial nominee Uddhav Thackeray on late Tuesday evening reached Raj Bhavan and staked claim to form the government in Maharashtra.

The Shiv Sena chief was accompanied by legislature party leaders of the NCP and Congress besides his own party leaders.

"We are submitting a joint statement of staking claim for government formation before the governor. We will also produce proof of the support of all the MLAs of the three parties to the governor as a part of the mandatory procedure," a Sena leader said.

The development has brought the curtains down on a high voltage drama that unfolded over the last few days and witnessed never-seen-before events like lifting of the President’s Rule at 5:47 a.m. and clandestine swearing in at 8 in the morning.

The BJP was clearly rattled by coming together of unlikely partners – the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) led by Sharad Pawar, the Congress and the Shiv Sena – to forge an alliance after the latter broke ranks with BJP.

The unexpected twists and turns continued till Tuesday evening even as the Supreme Court, earlier in the day, ordered a compulsory floor test to be conducted on November 27. BJP chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and NCP rebel Ajit Pawar, who had been claiming to have the majority, conceded defeat on Tuesday before facing the test of majority on the floor of the Assembly.

Hours after Fadnavis quit, a post-poll alliance of NCP-Congress-Sena picked Uddhav Thackeray, 59, as its nominee for the chief minister's post.

The decision was taken at a joint meeting of the three parties at a suburban hotel in Mumbai.

While state NCP chief Jayant Patil proposed Thackeray's name as "the (next) chief minister", the State Congress chief Balasaheb Thorat seconded the proposal.

The meeting was attended by NCP chief Sharad Pawar, senior party leader Praful Patel, Congress leader Ashok Chavan, Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatana's Raju Shetti, Samajwadi Party's Abu Azmi, MLAs of all these parties and others.

The three parties named their alliance as 'Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi'.

The Sena's 56 MLAs along with the NCP and Congress' 54 and 44 legislators, respectively, would take the combine's tally to 154. The majority mark in a House of 288 is 145.

Uddhav, who had emerged as a consensus candidate on Nov 22 evening and was set to be the chief minister before the BJP turned the tables on its former ally, will be the first from the Thackeray family to assume a government post.

Sharad Pawar, who spoke to Ajit over phone in the morning asking him to revisit his decision, has been credited for the U-turn by his nephew and was being described as the 'man of the match'. Ajit Pawar cited "personal reasons” for his decision to quit.

Fadnavis handed over his resignation to the Governor after he announced his decision at a crowded news conference in Mumbai.

Ajit Pawar had supported the BJP as leader of the 54-member NCP legislature party and with his resignation earlier in the day, the government has lost majority, said Fadnavis, hours after the Supreme Court ordered the floor test for the BJP leader to prove his majority.

The court said there is a "possibility of horse trading" in case of a delay in floor test. The Governor had on Saturday given 14 days’ time to Fadnavis to prove his majority, the apex court was told on Monday.

"We don't have majority after Ajit Pawar's resignation as deputy chief minister," Fadnavis said on a day of fast paced political and legal developments.

Fadnavis said the BJP will become the voice of the people as a responsible opposition. "We won't indulge in horse-trading," he added.

"Ajit Pawar told me he was quitting due to personal reasons."

In its order, the apex court also directed that the voting in the Assembly will not be on the basis of secret ballot and the entire proceedings will have to be telecast live.

"In a situation wherein, if the floor test is delayed, there is a possibility of horse trading, it becomes incumbent upon the Court to act to protect democratic values. An immediate floor test, in such a case, might be the most effective mechanism to do so," said a bench comprising Justices N.V. Ramana, Ashok Bhushan and Sanjiv Khanna.

The resignation of Fadnavis came a day after the Sena-led alliance paraded 162 MLAs in an unprecedented show of strength at a luxury hotel in Mumbai on Monday night indicating that the numbers were stacked heavily against the BJP. The alliance, which is expected to have a Common Minimum Programme (CMP), was stitched after hectic parleys involving Uddhav Thackeray, Sharad Pawar and Congress President Sonia Gandhi.

Once being the only second chief minister in Maharashtra to complete the full five-year term, Fadnavis now holds the dubious distinction of being the CM with the shortest tenure of four days in the last 59 years.

Governor Koshyari called a special session of the Legislative Assembly on Wednesday for the 288 newly-elected members to take oath.

The oath will be administered by newly-appointed pro-tem speaker Kalidas Kolambkar. The session will begin at 8 am.

The swearing-in ceremony is scheduled to take place on December 1 at the iconic Shivaji Park in Mumbai at 5 pm," NCP spokesman Nawab Malik said.