Maharashtra: Scramble for new deputy CM to begin soon

NCP faces challenges in selecting a new deputy chief minister and finance minister after Ajit Pawar's death, with discussions set to begin post-mourning.

MUMBAI: The sudden death of deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar has presented the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) with two immediate challenges: choosing a senior leader as deputy chief minister and finding someone to fill Pawar’s shoes as finance minister.

Maharashtra deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar's last rites were performed at the Vidya Pratishthan ground on Thursday. (PTI)

Discussions within the NCP will formally begin after the three-day mourning period ends on Saturday. Pawar, who died in a plane crash in Baramati on Wednesday, was both deputy chief minister and finance minister in the Mahayuti government.

The NCP’s choice of deputy chief minister, however, will not be determined by internal consensus alone. The leader will also be vetted by the BJP, the senior partner in the three-party ruling Mahayuti alliance, of which the NCP is a constituent. After the NCP picks its leader, chief minister Devendra Fadnavis will, in turn. take the BJP’s national leadership into confidence.

Appointing a new finance minister, the second challenge, will likely take place after the upcoming budget session concludes. Until then, Fadnavis will hold the finance portfolio.

The BJP expects the NCP to make its choice of deputy chief minister at the earliest. “We expect the process to begin by Saturday, after the mourning period ends. The party will have to choose a leader of the legislative party, who will automatically become deputy chief minister. The NCP is expected to meet the chief minister after the Pawar family, especially Sunetra Pawar and her sons, take a decision on this,” said a BJP leader.

Insiders in the government say that apart from Ajit Pawar’s wife Sunetra, senior ministers Chhagan Bhujbal and Hasan Mushrif could contenders for the deputy chief minister’s position. Senior legislator and former finance minister Dilip Walse Patil may be out of the running due to ill-health.

“Bhujbal too is not keeping well. Besides, he is considered close to Devendra Fadnavis and the BJP, prompting the NCP leadership to keep him out of the reckoning. A question mark remains over Mushrif’s name owing to his acceptability to the BJP as he is a Muslim leader, but the party may still give its nod,” said an NCP leader.

Although Ajit Pawar was the NCP’s legislative party leader as well as its national president, these two posts could be held by two different leaders in the changed scenario, said the leader.

Meanwhile, the budget session of the state legislature is just three weeks away and budget preparations are behind schedule, owing to local body elections. The chief minister is thus expected to keep the finance portfolio and present the budget himself, said a senior official with the state finance department.

With the budget session scheduled to begin on February 23, the state’s budget is expected to be presented on March 4 or 6. Pre-budget preparations by the finance department started late as Ajit Pawar was busy with local body polls for the last two months. Appointing a new finance minister, at this point, is an impossible challenge.

Preparations for the budget begin two months in advance. It includes department-wise reviews and meetings with representatives of commerce and business bodies. Although Ajit Pawar held an initial review meeting to take stock of the financial health of the state early this week, department-wise meetings were scheduled to start after February 5, after the zilla parishad elections, said the finance department official.

“Under these circumstances, it would be very difficult for a new leader to prepare the budget and present it,” he said.

The three-day state mourning following Pawar’s death has also prompted the state election commission (SEC) to postpone elections to 12 zilla parishads and 125 panchayat samitis by two days, to February 7. The results will be declared on February 9.

“The process of nominations and withdrawal of nominations has been completed, but the state mourning has postponed polling. This will give key leaders like Fadnavis and deputy chief minister Ekanth Shinde two more days,” said an SEC official.