It’s official: Devendra Fadnavis to stay and lead

Devendra Fadnavis had wished to resign from the government after the Lok Sabha results. File pic

Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis will stay in the government and also lead the party's charge in the state Assembly elections. The party high command has rejected his desire to resign from the government in the wake of the Lok Sabha results in Maharashtra. It asked him and other senior leaders to get cracking together as a team ahead of the October Assembly elections.

Accepting sole responsibility for the unexpected Lok Sabha results early this month, Fadnavis had wished to resign and work full-time for the party organisation with an intent to better the show in the Assembly elections. Even before Tuesday's meeting, he was asked to continue in the government. The official word came in front of important national and state leaders. The possibility of a change of guard at the state and Mumbai BJP units was dismissed at the meeting.

A day after it was given the in-charge for Assembly elections, the state core committee met with the Union Minister Amit Shah, party president J P Nadda, state in-charge Bhupender Yadav and deputy in-charge Ashwini Vaishnaw in New Delhi on Tuesday. From Maharashtra, Fadnavis, Union Minister Piyush Goyal, state president Chandrashekhar Bawankule, national general secretary Vinod Tawde, national secretary Pankaja Munde, ex-presidents Raosaheb Danve and Chandrakant Patil, Sudhir Mungantiwar and Mumbai president Ashish Shelar were present. The core committee had passed a resolution asking Fadnavis to stay and requesting the national leadership to reject his resignation.

Since 2014, the BJP had gone to polls under Fadnavis's leadership. Fadnavis became the party's first CM after winning 122 MLAs under his command. Five years later, the party bagged a majority in association with Shiv Sena, but the pre-poll coalition broke up leading to unexpected formations. The BJP is again in the contest for retaining power with the ruling partners Shiv Sena (Shinde), Nationalist Congress Party (Ajit Pawar) and smaller parties. BJP had 105 MLAs in 2019. The Sena and NCP splinters have 40 each. The state Assembly has 288 seats. The party or coalition that reaches the halfway mark makes a government.

In Tuesday night's meeting, the causes of poor performance were reviewed and the remedy planned. A plus point for the party is said to be a very small difference in vote share between the NDA and MVA. Factors such as the Opposition's narratives, Maratha reservation and public issues that impacted the poll outcome were on the agenda. It is said that the thrust will be given to united efforts and distribution of work between the senior state leaders who have been kept in the loop.

After the meeting, Union Minister Piyush Goyal ruled out any changes in the leadership in Maharashtra.

Fadnavis said that the Lok Sabha performance and the strategy for the Assembly polls were discussed. "The difference in vote share is just 0.3 per cent. We discussed where we didn't get many votes and faced difficulties. The corrective action was also discussed," he added.

The state core committee will meet in Mumbai on June 22. Later, meetings with alliance partners will be held in order to finalise the seat-sharing formula at the earliest.

June 18
Day state leaders met with BJP leadership