MUMBAI / NEW DELHI
The Congress, Shiv Sena and the NCP have approached the Supreme Court after the BJP sudden move to form government in Maharashtra and installed Devendra Fadnavis as Chief Minister and the NCP’s Ajit Pawar as his deputy.
The Congress’s Randeep Singh Surjewala in a press conference this evening said the BJP has “betrayed” the people of Maharashtra. “November 23 will be a black chapter in the history of India when an illegitimate government was constituted by the Governor acting as a hitman on the Constitution of India at the instance of the Home Minister,” Mr Surjewala said.
The three parties that had been working out the fine contours of forming government in Maharashtra, until the BJP announced its move today, approached the Supreme Court against what they claimed is an “illegitimate government”. They focussed their attack on the Governor over the situation.
“There is nothing in public domain as to how and in what manner Shri Devendra Fadnavis and/or the BJP had staked claim power between the intervening night of 22.11.2019 and 23.11.2019,” the three parties said in their petition to the Supreme Court.
“Further there is no material in the public domain to show that Shri Devendra Fadnavis had carried letters of support of 144 MLA’s (which in any event was not legally possible to do). The Petitioners categorically assert that all the MLA’s of the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress are completely and solidly with the alliance except for Shri Ajit Pawar,” the petition said.
“It is submitted that the Hon’ble Governor has acted in a partisan manner and has made a mockery of the high office of the Governor. It is respectfully submitted that the Governor’s actions between the intervening night of 22.11.2019 and 23.11.2019 culminating to the swearing in on the 23.11.2019 are a text book example of the Governor acting at the behest of a political party in power at the Centre,” it said.
The Nationalist Congress Party’s (NCP) Ajit Pawar had been present last night at a meeting in which the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress had sealed an alliance with Uddhav Thackeray as chief minister. “From the day the results were announced to this day…. no party was able to form the government. Maharashtra was facing many issues, including farmer issues. So we decided to form a stable government,” he said.
Earlier at a joint press conference in Mumbai earlier, NCP chief Sharad Pawar said his nephew Ajit’s decision is an act of indiscipline and that no NCP worker is in favour of an NCP-BJP govt in the state. “An honest NCP worker can never be a part of the BJP government formation,” he said, adding around 11 MLAs and Ajit have joined hands with the BJP. However, four-time NCP MLA Rajendra Shingane said they were “misled”. Pawar further said they can’t rule out a possibility of “cheating by the governor” and that Ajit Pawar may have submitted a ‘ready-made’ list of NCP MLAs.