It Was My Proposal To Make Eknath Shinde The CM, Says Dy CM Devendra Fadnavis

Fadnavis said the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance had won the 2019 elections, but the mandate was “stolen”.

New Delhi: For the first time after the change of power in Maharashtra and becoming the Deputy CM in the new government, BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis reached his home constituency Nagpur and said he had proposed to BJP leadership to make Eknath Shinde, the new chief minister after the collapse of the MVA government last week. Regarding accepting the post of Deputy CM, the former Chief Minister said that he has done so on the orders of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, as reported by news agency PTI.

“Our leaders Narendra Modi ji, Amit Shah and J P Naddaji and with my approval (the decision to make Shinde the CM was taken).... It will not be wrong if it is said that I took this proposal (to the BJP leadership) that Shinde is made the chief minister and they (the leadership) accepted it,” Fadnavis said.

Fadnavis said BJP leadership accepted that he ought to be essential for the government as it was not right to run the govt through an "extra-constitutional authority".

Conversing with journalists here, Fadnavis said the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance had won the 2019 elections, but the mandate was “stolen”. So his party and the Shinde-led Shiv Sena group met up for a "common ideology and not for power".

Shinde took oath on June 30 with Fadnavis as his deputy, a day after Uddhav Thackeray resigned as the CM ahead of the floor test.

“It was also decided that I will stay out of the government. But BJP president J P Nadda called me and said the party has decided (to make me the deputy chief minister). Even Union Home Minister Amit Shah also spoke to me," Fadnavis said.

Fadnavis said he was not mentally ready to acknowledge the Dy CM's post and had decided that he will help the Shinde government from outside.

"However, I adjusted my perspective complying with the sets of my chiefs," he added.

(With PTI inputs)