No Early Cabinet Expansion in Maharashtra ?

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

special report

No Early Cabinet Expansion in Maharashtra ?

New inductions after Nagpur session  

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, Dec 1

The suspense over estranged nephew Ajit Pawar’s induction into the Uddhav Thackeray government will continue for some more time. It transpires that the next expansion of the Maharashtra Cabinet will take place only after the Nagpur session of the State Assembly. The Session is likely to be held between December 16 to 21.

Sources say that the top leadership of the alliance partners comprising of NCP Chief Sharad Pawar, Sena Chief Uddhav Thackeray and Congress leaders felt that the next expansion be held only after the Nagpur session of the Assembly. The induction of ministers from all the three parties and a couple of others may wait as Uddhav wants to initiate a series of steps for the welfare of the people immediately.

The two core committees – one for the Cabinet and the other for alliance partners – are also to be set up first so that better coordination could be evolved at all levels.

Secondly, Ajit Pawar continues to have certain reservations and wants more time to settle down in the new situation. He plans to visit his constituency.

Ends

No Early Cabinet Expansion in Maharashtra ?

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

special report

No Early Cabinet Expansion in Maharashtra ?

New inductions after Nagpur session  

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, Dec 1

The suspense over estranged nephew Ajit Pawar’s induction into the Uddhav Thackeray government will continue for some more time. It transpires that the next expansion of the Maharashtra Cabinet will take place only after the Nagpur session of the State Assembly. The Session is likely to be held between December 16 to 21.

Sources say that the top leadership of the alliance partners comprising of NCP Chief Sharad Pawar, Sena Chief Uddhav Thackeray and Congress leaders felt that the next expansion be held only after the Nagpur session of the Assembly. The induction of ministers from all the three parties and a couple of others may wait as Uddhav wants to initiate a series of steps for the welfare of the people immediately.

The two core committees – one for the Cabinet and the other for alliance partners – are also to be set up first so that better coordination could be evolved at all levels.

Secondly, Ajit Pawar continues to have certain reservations and wants more time to settle down in the new situation. He plans to visit his constituency.

Ends

Pawar daydreaming on mid-term poll in Maha

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Pawar day dreaming about mid-term poll in Maharashtra

BJP not worried about Sena

Amit Shah confident SS will vote for BJP presidential candidate

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, June 7

The BJP high command dismissed senior NCP leader Sharad Pawar’s view that Maharashtra is heading towards a mid-term poll.

“Pawar Saheb is day-dreaming. His party is looking for a role in the state and at the Centre. He thinks that Shiv Sena will desert BJP and there will be political role for his party. But nothing of this kind will happen,” said a senior general secretary of the party on the condition of not being quoted.

The general secretary said Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis is handling the state in perfectly. If he has taken a decision to announce the package sometime in October, it is largely because the Monsoon is about to set in the state. It is expected that immediate problems of the farmers would be resolved and a fair assessment will be made about the compensation to them only after the Monsoon.

  

The BJP leader said  that Pawar is a worried man because the probe agencies continue to go after cases of corruption. The Enforcement Directorate had already gone after Ajit Pawar and the CBI registered an FIR in the aircraft purchase case during UPA regime.

With regard to relations with Shiv Sena, BJP president Amit Shah had told a small group of journalists last week that relations with the ally are cordial.

Amit Shah had said the allies do have their own views on certain issues. The Shiv Sena is an ally at the Centre and in the state and he had not heard anything that they have  changein a democratic set up, an ally is free to express its view and it will be seriously looked into.

The BJP leadership is confident that Shiv Sena will vote for the party’s Presidential this time. It may be mentioned that the Shiv Sena did not vote for the BJP candidate during the two previous Presidential elections. But the Modi-Amit Shah team is confident that Sena will vote for the BJP candidate.

Water train to nowhere

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

The water-starved Latur district of Maharashtra's Marathwada region is now witnessing the frightening sight of armed guards patrolling along its water reservoirs, where assembly of more than five persons has been banned. With an unrelenting summer leaving most parts of India baked to bone, it is no more an unbelievable sight that water lorries are piling up in all sorts of unthought-of places: Usha Kiran Building, on Mumbai's Carmichael Road, its toniest patch, where the late Dhirubhai Ambani lived with his family for many years; Subhadra, at Worli, which houses, among others, BJP minister Nitin Gadkari and NCP heavyweight Ajit Pawar; not to speak of the chrome-and-steel skyscrapers in proud Gurgaon, the Millenium City in Delhi's outskirts which will come to a standstill without the water tankers.