Maharashtra Cabinet Expands: 39 MLAs Sworn In Ahead of Winter Session

Nagpur(The Uttam Hindu): Thirty-nine Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) were inducted into the Maharashtra cabinet on Sunday, a day before the commencement of the Winter Session of the state legislature. The swearing-in ceremony, held in Nagpur, was attended by key political figures, including Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and Union Minister Nitin Gadkari.

The new broadened cabinet includes leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Shiv Sena, and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), with state BJP chief Chandrasekhar Bawankule among those swearing in. The formation of the cabinet is now seen as an important step for finalizing power-sharing in the Mahayuti alliance which won a landslide victory at the 2024 Maharashtra Assembly elections.

Post the election, which saw the Mahayuti alliance securing 230 out of 288 seats, the Home portfolio was retained by Chief Minister Fadnavis. This had long been an area of conflict between BJP and Shiv Sena, but now that the point is amply addressed, Fadnavis took oath as CM on December 5, along with former CM Eknath Shinde and NCP's Ajit Pawar being named his deputies.

Among those who took oath were prominent leaders Dhananjay Munde, Sanjay Rathod, Dada Bhuse, Ganesh Naik, Gulabrao Patil, and Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil. Before the swearing-in ceremony was a roadshow and prayer sessions led by some of the ministers. It is the second swearing-in ceremony since 1991 held in Nagpur; the event has underlined the strategic importance of this city in the Maharashtra political landscape.