Maharashtra Political Crisis : Entire Scenario Explained

Maharashtra, also known as the heart of India , has been under a massive political crisis for the last 2 weeks. The ruling party before the crisis Maha Vikas Aghadi Party was a mixture of Congress Party, NCP and Shiv Sena. The election of 2019 had resulted in BJP forming a majority. The BJP had 105 votes in favour from the total 288 votes. Also Shiv Sena and BJP were assumed to get together and form the government. However both the parties wanted their chairperson to lead the state’s administration. Shiv Sena wanted Uddhav Thackeray to lead the ministry whereas BJP wanted Devendra Fadnavis to lead the ministry. On the final day Shiv Sena announced its ties with the Indian National Congress and Sharad Pawar’s NCP and formed the government. Thus the roots of the crisis lie in 2019 when Shiv Sena Abandoned BJP post the election results.

2019 Votes and Scenario

The 2019 election had a total number of 288 seats. Out of that 105 were claimed by Bharatiya Janata Party, 56 seats were claimed by Shiv Sena, 54 seats were won by Sharad Pawar’s NCP and 44 seats were with Congress. After the results the coalition of BJP and Shiv Sena was set to happen. However at the end due to different criterias the Shiv Sena went on to join the NCP and Congress. The reason for explaining the same is to decode the major reason behind the recent crisis.

Reason Behind the Rebels

The Shiv Sena Party was formed by Bala Saheb Thackeray who was a staunch believer of Hindutva. He formed the party with the same principles and ideologies. The ideologies of Bala Saheb Thackeray are similar to those of the Bharatiya Janata Party. Hence everyone was expecting a coalition of these two parties. But the results shocked the entire country. Hence the government formation with a sudden assumed betrayal of BJP was a major reason behind the current crisis. Shiv Sena has multiple powerful MLAs like Eknath Shinde but the legacy was given more importance than influence. In other words Uddhav Thackarey’s son, Aditya Thackeray was given more highlight than veteran leaders like Eknath Shinde which was another reason behind the rebellion.

The Strategy

Eknath Shinde who was one of the most influential party members and staunch supporter of Bala Saheb’s ideologies took 29 other MLA’s with him on 22nd June, 2022 and went missing. All of them were found to be resting in a hotel in Surat. Later on the number of MLAs leaving Shiv Sena increased to 37. 

The number of MLA here is a very important figure. The reason is for forming a majority government in Maharashtra any party has to get 145 seats in total. Due to the rebellion, the Shiv Sena lost 37 MLA out of 56 MLA. This means they are only left with 19 MLA now. This brings down their majority of Maha Vikas Aghadi Party to 138 MLAs. Thus the government was officially broken and also they had to face a no confidence motion. In other words the Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray has to face the floor test to prove his majority in front of the Assembly and the entire State.

Political Crisis

With this move the entire government was disrupted and the NCP and Congress were in a disrupted state. The reason behind this is the Shiv Sena leader Uddhav Thackeray said that he is ready to quit the NCP and Congress Alliance if the Shiv Sena MLAs get back to the party. But before this the MLAs who left had already considered Eknath Shinde as the new leader and formed a new party with the name Shiv Sena BalaSaheb. This move of Uddhav Thackeray proved that he is now in no control of the party’s situation and hence he wanted to compromise. 

However the new move was already into action and the only way out from the same was anti-defection law. Thus Uddhav Thackeray filed the same against 12 MLAs from the rebellion group. The reason is if he wins the same he can get the rest of the MLAs back and end this war. However as per the law if more than 2/3rd of the party MLAs leave the same then the anti-defection law does not apply. The same thing happened here and hence on the night before the floor test Uddhav Thackeray resigned from his post of the Chief Minister of Maharashtra.

New Chief Minister

The Maharashtra government was formed again on 30th June, 2022. The BJP group has a nomination of Devndra fadnavis and Eknath Shinde was the obvious leader of the rebel group. Everyone was expecting Devendra Fadnavis to lead the new government. But it is always BJP’s style to shock everyone. Thus Eknath Shinde was made the new Chief Minister of Maharashtra. Devendra Fadnavis was made the Deputy Chief Minister. Hence the entire Shiv Sena coalition was broken and the new government was formed by Bharatiya Janata Party and Shiv Sena BalaSaheb.