MahaYuti to contest Assembly election under Eknath Shinde's leadership: Fadnavis

Mumbai, Sep 6 (IANS) Deputy Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Friday said that the MahaYuti will contest the upcoming assembly election under the leadership of Chief Minister Eknath Shinde saying that there is no dispute among the alliance partners over the CM’s face.  

At the interactive session organised by a Marathi channel, Fadnavis said: "Eknath Shinde is the head of the state. The person who holds the post of Chief Minister leads the election. When we have the Chief Minister, we do not think of another face. The assembly election will be contested under the leadership of Eknath Shinde. I cannot say who will be the Chief Minister after the election. That authority is with the parliamentary board of our party and the National Democratic Alliance."

"The BJP's Parliamentary Board will take a decision on the post of Chief Minister after the assembly election. The decision taken by the main leaders of the National Democratic Alliance will be acceptable to all of us. At present, we are all going to go before the people as a government while campaigning for the assembly elections. Eknath Shinde is the head of the state, so we will go before the people under his leadership," reiterated Fadnavis, making it clear that there are no differences among the MahaYuti partners on this issue.

To a question whether the BJP has given any assurance to Shinde that he will become CM after the assembly election, Fadnavis said: "Our (party's) Parliamentary Board will take a decision regarding the post of Chief Minister. If they have any discussion about this, it will come before us after some time and we will decide accordingly. I think we don't need to discuss anything at this point in time."

He further stated that the "BJP Parliamentary Board, Shiv Sena national president Eknath Shinde and NCP national president Ajit Pawar together will take a decision regarding who will be the CM after the assembly election. We will accept the decision taken by these leaders".

Fadnavis' statement came at a time when differences apparently surfaced among the Shiv Sena UBT, Congress and NCP-SP over the chief ministerial face.

Shiv Sena-UBT chief Uddhav Thackeray has recently told the Congress and NCP-SP to declare the CM's face whom he would support wholeheartedly.

However, NCP-SP chief Sharad Pawar said that there was no need to declare MVA's CM face before the assembly election, adding that the alliance partners would together take the decision based on the number of seats. State Congress chief Nana Patole also stated that the three parties are contesting together as MVA and based on the number of seats the decision on the CM will be taken after the assembly election.

As far as the Ladki Bahin scheme is concerned, Fadnavis admitted that it was launched on the lines of the Ladli Behana scheme implemented by the former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.

"There is no credit war among the MahaYuti partners on the success of the Ladki Bahin scheme. There are many schemes which are implemented in the state but the Ladki Bahin scheme is getting more focus," he said.

Fadnavis criticised the opposition for playing politics over the collapse of the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s statue at Rajkot fort at Malvan in Sindhudurg district.

"The people of Maharashtra have been sad after the fall of the statue. However, it is unfortunate that the opposition is doing politics on this issue and seeing political opportunity in it," he said.