Several Rashtriya Janata Dal Members of Parliament, Legislative Assembly and Legislative Council submitted their resignations to party supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav on Tuesday to protest the campaign against north Indians initiated by the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena and the Shiv Sena in Mumbai.
Scores of people, claiming to be Shah Rukh Khan fans, on Friday held a protest in central Delhi against the Shiv Sena for targeting the actor. Shouting slogans, the protesters, led by local Member of Legislative Assembly Shoaib Iqbal gathered near Delite cinema in Daryaganj and burnt the effigies of Sena leaders Bal Thackeray and his son Uddhav. Shiv Sena had on Thursday threatened it will not allow the screening of the film in cinemas and multiplexes in the National Capital.
The rebel legislators have been maintaining that they were forced to go against Thackeray as he kept ignoring their plea to snap ties with the MVA allies despite being told that these constituents were trying to 'finish off' the Sena.
'The BJP used Shinde and Shiv Sena to decimate Uddhav Thackeray, humiliate him by taking away his party as well as party symbol.' 'The Shiv Sena and Eknath Shinde have served their purpose.'
Devendra Fadnavis will lead the new Mahayuti coalition government in Maharashtra, with Eknath Shinde and Ajit Pawar serving as deputy chief ministers. The swearing-in ceremony is scheduled for Thursday evening at Azad Maidan ground in south Mumbai and will be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and several Union ministers. The Mahayuti coalition won the recent assembly elections by a landslide, securing 230 out of 288 seats.
First-time Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Rahul Narvekar on Friday filed his nomination as the party candidate for the post of Maharashtra assembly speaker, election for which, if required, will be held on July 3.
"Just bargaining was going on over what he (Ajit) should be getting. As per our information, he has been given a promise of chief minister's post by pushing Eknath Shinde aside with the help of Assembly speaker's decision (on disqualification of 16 Shiv Sena MLAs)," the former CM claimed.
The much-delayed expansion of the 41-day-old Maharashtra ministry saw as many as 17 former ministers taking oath on Tuesday.
Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Wednesday said Uddhav Thackeray will remain the chief minister of Maharashtra and the ruling coalition Maha Vikas Aghadi will prove its majority on the floor of the assembly if needed, an assertion coming against the backdrop of rebellion by senior Cabinet member Eknath Shinde that has put a question mark on the stability of the state government.
A statement from Raj Bhavan said that Koshyari requested the ECI to declare elections to the nine vacant seats of the Maharashtra Legislative Council 'at the earliest'. The state cabinet had on April 9 recommended Thackeray's nomination as one of the governor nominees in the Legislative Council.
Fadnavis recently said the previous MVA government had given a target to then Mumbai police commissioner Sanjay Pandey to put me in jail, but the police officer could not succeed as he had done nothing wrong.
Since Independence, Lok Sabha Speakers have been chosen by consensus.
All the current political upheavals in Maharashtra are with the 2024 elections in mind and there is a degree of white-knuckle tension in all parties.
A Sena legislator felt that Aaditya hitting the road has come very late, but stressed that this is also an opportunity for him to prove himself and build his own team.
Three MLAs abstained, while 20 legislators, most of them from Congress and the NCP, including Congress's Ashok Chavan and Vijay Wadettiwar, both former ministers, were absent during the trust vote.
Parties are currently trading charges over issues of corruption.
The BJP's core committee will meet on Sunday and decide the future course of action, party leader Chandrakant Patil said.
The MLAs, who are seemingly unhappy with their leadership, arrived in Surat on Monday night and are camping at the Le Meridian Hotel, they said.
MLAs of smaller parties like the Bachhu Kadu-led Prahar and Independent legislators also attended the meeting, Prabhu added.
"The arrogance of buying any politician and form a government will no longer work in this state. The bubble of being invincible has burst," Raut said.
The MLAs of the three ruling parties and the BJP have reached Mumbai ahead of the elections.
In his address over Facebook on June 22, Thackeray had talked about his willingness to step down if the rebel MLAs come to Mumbai and make such a demand.
BJP Rajya Sabha member Narayan Rane came out openly in support of Eknath Shinde.
'The BJP is using its money and muscle power to break the MVA government.'
The BJP has nominated Union Power Minister Piyush Goyal as its candidate from Maharashtra for Rajya Sabha election.
The Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party has issued a whip to all MLAs asking them to remain present for a key meeting in Mumbai on Wednesday, while the rival group headed by Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar has also called a separate meeting of party legislators in Mumbai.
After being outwitted by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party in the recent Rajya Sabha elections in Maharashtra, the ruling Shiv Sena-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) is now facing another challenge of getting all its six candidates elected to the state Legislative Council in the June 20 polls, which has once again put the spotlight on Independents and smaller parties.
Of the 288 assembly seats, the Shiv Sena will contest 124 and the BJP 150. Other seats will go to smaller NDA parties.
The coming weeks are sure to have a lot of drama unfolding in Maharashtra, predicts N Sathiya Moorthy.
Earlier, there were speculations that the party may nominate Pankaja Munde, the daughter of late BJP leader Gopinath Munde, for the MLC polls, to be held on June 20.
Discussions on other issues are in progress, Pawar said after the meeting, held at the Nehru Centre in Worli.
"If we had the numbers, we wouldn't have waited for anyone. The Congress and the NCP didn't cross the 100 mark...we will work as a responsible opposition," Pawar said.
Thackeray on Tuesday announced his party's support for Murmu in the July 18 presidential election.
Defying predictions of his political eclipse, Nationalist Congress Party chief Ajit Pawar has not only consolidated his position in the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Mahayuti, but also fortified his place in Maharashtra politics by becoming deputy chief minister for the sixth time.
On his part, BJP Lok Sabha MP Narayan Rane, himself no stranger to controversies, got into damage control mode and sought to calm frayed nerves, saying he has chided his son over the remarks.
'If someone fiddles us on our religion then we will pay back five times more to that person. We have proved that time and again.'
Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari has asked the Maharashtra Legislature Secretary to hold a floor test of Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government at 11 am on Thursday.
Thackeray claimed that the construction of the bridge was completed two weeks ago but it was not opened to the public as Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde had no time to inaugurate it.
Thackeray's statement comes in the backdrop of rebel group leader Eknath Shinde daring the party to disclose the names of some of the MLAs camping in Guwahati who were reportedly in touch with the party leadership.
Ahead of his Dussehra rally, Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on Wednesday tweeted a couplet by famous Hindi poet Harivansh Rai Bachchan, which said that whosoever is his heir will be his son and not vice versa.
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