Devendra Fadnavis is set for 2nd term as CM

Devendra Fadnavis is set for a second term as Maharashtra chief minister with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) winning 105 seats and its ally Shiv Sena 56 in the

Devendra Fadnavis is set for a second term as Maharashtra chief minister with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) winning 105 seats and its ally Shiv Sena 56 in the 288-member state assembly.

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The questions, however, are how long can Fadnavis stay in the top job, and whether the BJP can lead the alliance government for its full five-year term.

At the time of going to press, results for 286 seats were announced. In 2014, the BJP had won 122 seats, with the Sena winning 63. But with a lower tally, the BJP’s dependence on Shiv Sena has now gone up. It needs 40 Sena legislators to reach the halfway mark of 145. In 2014, it needed just 23. To be sure, Shiv Sena’s bargaining powers have increased considerably, and the party – which opposed the BJP on several issues even while being a partner in the previous government – will insist on an equal power-share agreement, including, possibly, splitting the chief minister’s post.

In a press conference on Thursday evening, Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray indicated as much. “We are in no rush to form the government,” he said. “We will first discuss (our stance) with BJP’s leadership, finalise our formula and then take a call. Who will be the chief minister is an important question. We had arrived at a 50:50 formula before the Lok Sabha election, and we want to stick to that.”

Senior BJP leaders told HT on Thursday that there was no alternative to Fadnavis within the party, and that he was likely to lead the government at least in the beginning, unless the top leadership was forced to review the situation. A senior party functionary, who did not wish to be named, admitted to HT that the Sena had enough bargaining chips to claim the CM’s post.

“There is no alternative to Fadnavis in the BJP with the Sena likely to be more aggressive,” the senior party leader said. “We contested the elections projecting him as the chief minister. He will be given a chance to lead again. While our state party chief Chandrakant Patil is close to the national president (Amit Shah), the party has lost seats in his home district of Kolhapur as well as the rest of western Maharashtra, which was his responsibility.”

Two of Fadnavis’ss main rivals – former minister Eknath Khadse and incumbent minister Vinod Tawde – were not given tickets. Another contender, the party’s Other Backward Class (OBC) face and daughter of the late BJP stalwart Gopinath Munde, Pankaja Munde lost the election from her home turf of Parli on Thursday to her cousin Dhananjay Munde of the NCP.

Political analysts said Fadnavis was indeed set for a second tenure, but pointed out that his next term would likely be characterised by a more aggressive opposition and ally, besides internal party rivalries and factionalism.

“Fadnavis will have to mollycoddle the Sena and keep it in good humour, while fending off a more aggressive Opposition,” said Nitin Birmal, a Pune-based political analyst. “Then, if push comes to shove, there is a possibility that NCP may support a Sena CM. With turncoats in the BJP, there will be greater factionalism within the party. It will be difficult to execute BJP’s agenda with such pressures.” In addition, nine of Fadnavis’ ministerial colleagues lost. This puts greater pressure on the chief minister.

Fadnavis, who also spoke to the media on Thursday, tried to downplay the BJP’s loss of face over the 2019 results, pointing out that the party had contested fewer seats than in 2014, and as such its “strike rate was over 70 per cent.”

“I have spoken to (Uddhav) Thackeray,” he said. “There are no ifs and buts with this mandate. Only the BJP-Sena alliance will come to power. The opposition may have won a few more seats, but they are in no position to celebrate victory.”

Insiders, however, are not sure. Fadnavis may have downplayed the results, but murmurs over what went wrong have already begun. “We didn’t realise that the Enforcement Directorate case against Pawar (in the Maharashtra State Cooperative Bank case) would be a turning point. He is a seasoned politician and he used it to consolidate Maratha votes and galvanise his party cadre. It was a wrong move,” admitted a senior BJP leader and current minister.

The other reason for the party’s less-than-expected result is the failure to stem rebellion within the saffron camp. Many of the independents who won are from the BJP-Sena camp who were refused tickets.

The decision to poach opposition political heavyweights and increase the BJP tally also seems to have backfired. Many of these turncoats – NCP’s Vaibhav Pichad, Dilip Sopal, Jaydutt Kshirsagar and former Congress leaders such as Harshawardhan Patil, Nirmala Gavit – are all trailing.

A BJP leader said the party would have to seriously look at whether these defections proved counter-productive.

“The party’s decision to make the abrogation of Article 370 as its central plank also seems to have been a non-starter on a population that faced devastating floods, drought and job losses,” said Birmal. Vidarbha was another factor, where the BJP had won 44 seats in 2014. On Thursday, it won 27. The Congress won 17 seats here and NCP triumphed in six. The party also could not make the necessary gains in NCP-Congress bastion of western Maharashtra that votes in 70 legislators. The Opposition managed to retain more than half of its home turf in this vital region..