Maharashtra is in its pocket, but why Mahayuti is still ironing out the wrinkles

Praful Patel, at one time Sharad Pawar’s right-hand man, was introducing to the national media Ajit Pawar who had wrested control of the NCP, having won 41 seats in the recent Assembly elections, with his uncle reduced to a mere 10.

Ajit Pawar sported a different image, dressed in casual shirt trousers and a jacket, mingling with mediapersons and answering questions on the new government about to be formed in Mumbai. There are indications he is set to be a Deputy CM again and retain the Finance portfolio.

After the Assembly results, as the BJP stood far ahead of the rest with 132 seats, “Ajit Dada (as he is called)” moved with alacrity and announced his support to Devendra Fadnavis as CM. This means Ajit Pawar would be there in the reckoning in any new arrangement and that, if push came to shove, it is the third partner, the Shiv Sena led by Eknath Shinde, who might find itself out of favour, especially due to Shinde’s initial insistence on being made CM again.

However, as of Monday, that is nine days after the people of Maharashtra gave the Mahayuti a massive mandate (236 out of 288 seats), the coalition has not been able to decide the contours of the new government. Neither, and this too is odd, has the BJP chosen to stake its claim, nor has the Governor invited it to form a government.

Even if the nuts and bolts of the power-sharing arrangement are still being worked out, the BJP – and this is the curious part of the story – has not even announced its CM candidate. If Ajit Pawar has already lent his support to Fadnavis as CM, Shinde has declared publicly that he will abide by the decision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.

With Fadnavis seen as the chief architect of the BJP’s biggest ever victory in Maharashtra, at 132 seats, the BJP has few options but to appoint him the CM. It cannot experiment in Maharashtra as it did earlier in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, by picking Bhajan Lal Sharma, Mohan Yadav or Vishnu Deo Sai, respectively – that is opting not to go for strong or established leaders.

The new CM in Maharashtra will need the experience and a steady hand to keep Eknath Shinde, Ajit Pawar, and the state bureaucrats in check, and yet push ahead with its infrastructural and development plans for the state.

The RSS, which has delivered both Haryana and Maharashtra to the BJP (unlike the Lok Sabha elections when it had held back), has been rooting strongly for Fadnavis as CM. The BJP cadre is also sympathetic towards him — bearing in mind that he had earlier agreed to be Deputy CM under Shinde.

“The only thing that goes against him is his caste,” a political journalist in Mumbai points out. With Fadnavis, a Brahmin, as CM, and with Marathas Shinde and Ajit Pawar as Deputy CMs – the scenario considered most likely – the BJP will have to innovatively accommodate OBCs, who consolidated in its favour in the Assembly elections. Union Home Minister Amit Shah consulted leaders like BJP Maratha face Vinod Tawde to find out the impact Fadnavis’s elevation would have on the Maratha community!

The chief ministership of the country’s second largest state in terms of parliamentary strength (48 Lok Sabha seats), on top of the BJP’s electoral performance under him, could also bring Fadnavis into national reckoning once again, at par with Yogi Adityanath in UP.

However, as CM from 2014-19, Fadnavis’s rule is remembered as a “one man show”, which ruffled some feathers in the party. By taking time to announce his name, the BJP brass may be sending a message that even if Fadnavis has crafted the party’s victory and becomes CM, “the control lies with us”.

Shinde, whose sudden “illness” and decision to head to his native village after talks in Delhi with the BJP leadership, raised eyebrows. While Shinde is supposedly bargaining hard for the Home Ministry, sources said he is too savvy not to know that the BJP would not part with the Home department, which was held by Fadnavis when he was CM as also Deputy CM.

Shinde also knows he does not have many cards up his sleeve. Moving to the Union cabinet in Delhi or supporting the new government from “outside” are non-options, politics having become so transactional today. Being out of power in Maharashtra could mean going out of the public mind.

The BJP has been trying to mollify him, not because it needs his Shiv Sena numbers (57) to form a government, but for other reasons – wresting control of the BMC from Uddhav Thackeray in the soon-to-be-held civic poll, for one. Shinde’s usefulness has lain in weakening Uddhav Thackeray – a process which is far from complete as 10 of the 20 overall seats the Shiv Sena (UBT) won were from Mumbai.

When he was appointed CM in 2022, few had heard of Eknath Shinde. He has used the last two years to create a political niche for himself as an up and coming Maratha leader (even quota activist Manoj Jarange-Patil has been soft on him) and a benefactor of social welfare schemes, particularly the Ladki Bahin Yojana.

He had appointed a committee of senior officials to suggest schemes that could be rolled out this year (keeping in mind the elections), and decided that Ladki Bahin Yojana should be rolled out in time for the Assembly elections, and not earlier for the Lok Sabha polls!

By helping delay the process of government formation, Shinde may also be using the situation to position himself as the tallest Maratha leader, after Sharad Pawar, that the BJP is going out of its way to woo – and cannot do without.