Maharashtra Cabinet Expansion: The oath-taking for the new ministers in the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Maharashtra government was held on Sunday, December 15, in Nagpur, ending the hectic parleys over the Chief Minister chair and ministry allocation.
With this, the new Maharashtra government expanded its cabinet today, consisting of a major share of ministerial berths for the BJP and several Shiv Sena and NCP MLAs as well. The strength of the cabinet has now reached 42.
While 33 legislators took oath as cabinet ministers, six others were sworn as ministers of state. The oath was administered to the new ministers at the ceremony by Governor P C Radhakrishnan.
BJP's state unit chief Chandrashekhar Bawankule and BJP leaders Radhakrishna Vikhepatil, Chandrakant Patil, Nitesh Rane, and Pankaja Munde have taken oath as Cabinet Ministers at the Raj Bhavan.
BJP leaders Ganesh Naik and Dhananjay Munde and Shiv Sena leaders Dadaji Dagadu Bhuse, Uday Samant, Sanjay Shirsat, and Sanjay Rathod also took oath as Cabinet Ministers.
List of Mahayuti leaders sworn-in as Maharashtra cabinet ministers:
BJP
- Meghana Bordikar
- Madhuri Misal
- Pankaj Bhoyar
- Akash Fundkar
- Shivendrasinh Bhosale
- Jaykumar Gore
- Sanjay Savkare
- Chandrashekhar Bawankule
- Radhakrishna Vikhepatil
- Chandrakant Patil
- Nitesh Rane
- Pankaja Munde
- Ganesh Naik
- Dhananjay Munde
- Ashish Shelar
Shiv Sena
- Yogesh Kadam
- Ashish Jaiswal
- Prakash Abitkar
- Sanjay Shirsat
- Pratap Sarnaik
- Bharat Gogawale
- Dadaji Dagadu Bhuse
- Uday Samant
- Sanjay Rathod
- Shambhuraj Desai
NCP
- Babasaheb Patil
- Aditi Tatkare
- Manikrao Kokate
- Narhari Zirwal
- Indranil Naik
- Makrand Jadhav-Patil
According to ABP Majha, 39 ministers took oath on Sunday ahead of the week-long winter session, slated to begin in Nagpur on December 16.
The cabinet expansion comes after Devendra Fadnavis took oath as Chief Minister along with Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde and NCP chief Ajit Pawar as his deputies at a grand swearing-in ceremony in Mumbai on December 5.
Ahead of the cabinet expansion, Fadnavis held a roadshow in Nagpur for the first time after the victory in the Assembly polls. He even paid a floral tribute to Babasaheb Ambedkar. The Maharashtra CM was accompanied by his wife Amruta Fadnavis and state BJP chief Bawankule.
In the Maharastra Assembly polls last month, the Mahayuti attained a landslide victory, winning 230 out of 288 seats in the state, with the BJP alone securing 132 seats. This was followed by Shinde's Shiv Sena, which bagged 57 seats, and Ajit Pawar's NCP which won 41 seats.
The BJP is anticipated to get 20-21 ministerial berths, followed by 11-12 for the Shinde Sena and 9-10 for the NCP. The council of ministers in Maharashtra can have a maximum of 43 members, including the chief minister and deputy CMs.
Out of the 12 MLAs from Shiv Sena, seven are new faces and five are being repeated, Shiv Sena MLA Bharatshet Gogawale told news agency ANI on Sunday.
Some of the BJP leaders who have been offered ministerial posts include: Nitesh Rane, Chandrakant Patil, Chandrashekhar Bawankule, Girish Mahajan, Shivendraraje Bhosale, Pankaja Munde, Ganesh Naik, Atul Save, and Ashok Uike among others.
On Friday, Maharashtra BJP chief Chandrashekhar Bawankule met deputy CMs Shinde and Ajit Pawar separately to finalise the cabinet formation. It was being said that Shinde was displeased over the allocation of key portfolios as he sought the home ad revenue ministry, especially after making way for Fadnavis to the top post. However, the BJP did not concede, and Fadnavis decided to retain the home ministry even in his new government.
Notably, Fadnavis held the home ministry when Shinde was the CM in the previous government, prompting Shinde to seek the ministry now as he is serving as the Deputy in Fadnavis's government.
According to ABP Majha, the Shiv Sena has been allocated key portfolios, including Urban Development (Eknath Shinde), Housing, Tourism, Industries, Health, Public Works (excluding undertakings), School Education, Water Supply, Water Conservation, Mining, Marathi Language, and Ex-Servicemen Welfare.