Less than a fortnight after rejecting the Adarsh scam report, Maharashtra cabinet on Thursday decided to partially accept recommendations of the judicial commission, announcing action against indicted bureaucrats but appeared going soft on politicians named by the commission.
Following are the possible contenders for the post of Maharashtra chief minister. We request our readers to take the poll at the end of this list.
Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray, who has issued a diktat to his partymen to greet Rahul Gandhi with black flags for his "Mumbai for all Indians" remark, on Friday attacked Marathi ministers at the Centre for "not protesting Rahul's anti-Mumbai statement".
Prithviraj Chavan helping out Delhi's government tide over high onion prices has not gone down well in his home state of Maharashtra, says Neeta Kolhatkar.
In the midst of the stand-off between the Congress and its ally Nationalist Congtress Party at the Centre, the urban development department headed by Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan on Friday came in for criticism by his Deputy Ajit Pawar over its alleged failure to spend funds allocated to it.
Addressing a press conference after an hour-long meeting with anti-graft crusader Anna Hazare, the chief minister said the Lokpal Bill was likely to be passed in the current session of Parliament.
The police do not have it in them to confront the Hindutva groups in a country ruled by a Hindutva party. No wonder Munawar Faruqui feels this is the end for him, asserts Jyoti Punwani.
In a bold move, Devendra Fadnavis-led Bharatiya Janata Party government has decided to downgrade security of top politicians of Congress and Nationalist Congress Party and their kin, including former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan and his then deputy Ajit Pawar.
But it is disappointing to note that Sitharaman's third Union Budget continues to promote a few problematic ideas, observes A K Bhattacharya.
Maharashtra on Saturday made a strong plea to the Centre to declare Belgaum and other disputed boundary areas as an Union Territory in the wake of "repression by Karnataka on Marathi-speaking people" there. An all-party delegation led by Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan submitted a memorandum to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in this regard. The delegation, which comprised Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, also raised the issue of handing over Indu Mill land in central Mumbai
Champion shooter Gagan Narang's Gun For Glory academy in Secunderabad is on its way to recovery, less than a month after a relentless downpour flooded the facility and damaged equipment.
Holding that the Adarsh Housing scam was a classic case of fence eating the crops and 'consistent failure' of Centre and Maharashtra government, the Comptroller and Auditor General on Tuesday said rules were bent to benefit relatives of politicians, public servants and senior service officers including former Army chiefs Gen Deepak Kapoor and N C Vij.
Maharashtra minister pleads for stay on land acquisition.
The Centre on Monday said it was not ruling out the possibility of the involvement of Jihadi or saffron terror groups in the triple blasts that killed 25 people in Mumbai on July 13. Home Minister P Chidambaram said Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan informed him on Sunday that the inputs received from the investigators suggested that the probe was progressing in the right direction.
After embarrassing his own government by publicly thrashing its ordinance on convicted legislators in public, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Friday trained his guns at the Maharashtra government for rejecting the Adarsh Inquiry Commission report.
Amid the heat over Maharashtra-Karnataka boundary dispute, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh sought to mollify Maharashtra by indicating that steps would be taken to protect the rights of linguistic minorities in border areas.
"The reason for the fire accident, as indicated by the report of Investigation Committee set up by BARC, is low intensity explosive energy released from accidental mixing of small quantities of reactive chemicals stored in the Chemical Laboratory," Minister of State in PMO Prithviraj Chavan said in a written reply in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday.
Alleging a failure by the Maharashtra government to act on inputs from central intelligence agencies of a possible terror strike in Pune, Opposition Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party MPs walked out of a meeting convened by Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan to raise the state's issues in Parliament.
The Income Tax Department on Wednesday raided the homes and offices of Bollywood actor Taapsee Pannu and filmmaker Anurag Kashyap as well as his partners who launched the now shuttered production house Phantom Films, officials said.
The Congress questioned the Maharashtra governor for the "arbitrary" allotment of time to the Nationalist Congress Party, the Shiv Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party to prove support for government formation.
"Chief Minister Ashok Chavan, during his recent visit to New Delhi, met Union Home Minister P Chidambaram and proposed the separate force of marine police to guard the coastal area of the state," Additional Chief Secretary of Home Department, Chandra Iyengar said on Tuesday.
The fire was brought under control after three hours, a Mumbai Fire Brigade official said, adding that cooling operations were underway.
The Board of Control for Cricket in India's disciplinary committee deferred a decision on the tainted duo of Ajit Chandila and Hiken Shah till January 5, giving them time till January 4 to file a written response to the charges of spot-fixing against them.
Tackle your hair and skin problems with expert help from Dr Dinesh Jain.
Dissatisfied with the steps taken by Pakistan to curb terrorism, the Centre on Wednesday said New Delhi will pressurise Islamabad to hand over wanted criminals to be tried under Indian law. "The Indian government is not satisfied with the steps taken by Pakistan to deal with terrorism so far," Union Minister of State in the Prime Minister's Office Prithviraj Chavan told reporters in Jammu.
'The Maharashtrian Congressmen's decision to break away from their reluctant leaders in Delhi to side with the Shiv Sena is seemingly the first sign that the 'high command' is not as powerful as is believed,' says Amulya Ganguli.
The move came at a time when deliberations between the Congress, the NCP and the Shiv Sena seemingly reached the final stage on Friday.
Unlike the frenzy and buzz in political circles during the last few days, the meetings on Thursday were held in a discreet manner.
BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi on Saturday attacked Congress for its decision to give tickets to "tainted" leaders, saying "Adarsh candidates" including Ashok Chavan and Pawan Kumar Bansal have been "rewarded".
Maharashtra Women and Child Development Minister Pankaja Munde finds herself in the middle of a Rs 206 crore scam, in what maybe called the first case of impropriety of the Devendra Fadnavis-led government.
The Shiv Sena has spurned Congress' request to participate in the bandh.
There have been more than 49,000 fire incidents in Mumbai in the last one decade, killing over 600 people, the Maharashtra government had told the assembly in November 2018.
The first of it was in February 1980 when the Indira Gandhi government dismissed the Progressive Democratic Front government headed by Sharad Pawar.
Obstacles in development of SEZs will be removed.
'The prime minister did not think that COVID-19 was a serious challenge as late as March 20.'
Senior Nationalist Congress Party leader Praful Patel on Friday said the Congress was delaying seat-sharing talks with his party in Maharashtra.
The Narendra Modi government should adopt an aggressive "tit for tat" policy towards Pakistan and should teach it a lesson if it creates trouble for India, National Democratic Alliance constituent Shiv Sena said on Tuesday.
The Congress protested vociferously both inside and outside Parliament on Monday against the political developments in Maharashtra as it stalled proceedings and accused the Bharatiya Janata Party of "murdering democracy" in the state.
They alleged that the central bank has "failed miserably" in handling the situation post-demonetisation.
Congress leaders feel party President Sonia Gandhi is withdrawing from centre-stage, but without her son filling that void, it could be continued chaos for her party.
