Days after Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis accepted responsibility for poor performance of the BJP in Maharashtra and decision to resign, Union Home Minister Amit Shah has spoken to the BJP leader and aksed him to continue his work in the government.
Earlier, Fadnavis met Shah on Thursday, reassuring his decision to resign. However, Shah advised the Maharashtra deputy CM to resume his duties until further discussions after PM Modi's oath-taking ceremony.
According to a report in NDTV, a discussion was held in the NDA meeting on Friday when Fadnavis sat down with fellow Deputy CM Ajit Pawar and CM Eknath Shinde to discuss the NDA performance in the state.
Fadnavis on Wednesday had offered to quit the post to enable him to focus on party work ahead of assembly elections after BJP’s Lok Sabha tally came down from 23 to 9 in Maharashtra.
“I take the responsibility for the result in Maharashtra. I am requesting the party leadership to relieve me from the responsibility in the government so that I can work full time for the party in upcoming assembly elections,” Fadnavis had said.
The assembly elections in Maharashtra are scheduled to take place in less than six months from now.
“The entire responsibility for this result is mine. I agree that I was lacking somewhere in all this and am going to make all efforts to overcome this shortcoming,” he said.
The Mahayuti alliance in Maharashtra, comprising of BJP, Eknath Shinde's Shiv Sena and Ajit Pawar's NCP, got 17 Lok Sabha seats while the Maha Vikas Aghadi comprising Congress, Uddhav Thackeray's Shiv Sena and Sharad Pawar's NCP secured 30 seats of the total 48 seats.
The Congress won 13 seats, Shiv Sena (UBT) got nine seats and NCP (SCP) won eight seats. The BJP won nine seats, Shiv Sena won seven seats and NCP won just one seat, taking the Mahayuti tally to 17 seats.