Devendra Fadnavis is now Maharashtra’s sevak

Fadnavis opting to call himself ‘sevak’ also resonates with Prime Minister Modi’s frequent assertions that he was the ‘Pradhan Sevak’ and not the ‘Pradhan Mantri’.

Overnight, Devendra Fadnavis has gone from being Maharashtra’s chief minister to Maharashtra’s Sevak – going by his changed twitter bio. This comes days after Fadnavis resigned after failing to reach an understanding with pre-poll ally the Shiv Sena over government formation.

Devendra Fadnavis (Kunal Patil/HT Photo)

This is the second time Fadnavis has made changes to his twitter handle and bio this year. On March 17, then CM Fadnavis had changed his twitter handle from @Dev_Fadnavis to “Chowkidar Devendra Fadnavis” , a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi added “chowkidar” to his Twitter handle profile and asked people to take the #MainBhiChowkidar pledge against corruption.

Fadnavis opting to call himself ‘sevak’ also resonates with Prime Minister Modi’s frequent assertions that he was the ‘Pradhan Sevak’ and not the ‘Pradhan Mantri’.

The BJP won 105 and Shiv Sena 56 seats in the recently-held assembly elections but despite the two together crossing the halfway mark, Fadnavis could not return to power as the two parties could not reach an agreement on the government formation, tripping on shared CM and portfolio disagreements. Their discussions went on for 16 days but with no result.

President’s rule has to be ratified by the Parliament in two months, after which it can be extended till six months and again for six more months, if elections are not possible within that period.

However, within this time frame, political parties have the right to stake claim to form the government at any point of time.