Impose President’s Rule in Maharashtra till SC decides, says Sanjay Raut

Raut pointed out that Shinde and Fadnavis are not expanding the council-of-ministers as they know what is going to come

Saying that the proverbial Sword of Damocles hangs over the “ek duje ke liye” government of Eknath Shinde and Devendra Fadnavis in Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena demanded that President’s Rule be imposed till the Supreme Court decides on the bunch of petitions.

“Barbados has a population of 2.5 lakhs and yet has a Cabinet of 27. Maharashtra's 12 crore population has a cabinet of two members that is taking arbitrary decisions… Where is the regard for the Constitution? Till the Constitutional Bench of the Supreme Court gives its verdict, impose President's Rule in Maharashtra,” Shiv Sena chief spokesperson and Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Raut said.

According to Raut, an “accident” is bound to happen in the near future. “Wait and watch,” tweeted Raut sharing a photo of Shinde, Fadnavis and BJP with Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari, in which he also posted a couplet - “unki muskarahat me na jana, diya toh kabar pe bhi jal raha hai”.

Raut pointed out that while Shinde and Fadnavis were sworn in as Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister, respectively, on 30 June, they are not expanding the council-of-ministers as they know what is going to come.

Raut also pointed out that the government is “completely illegal” and they had also pointed this out to the Governor.

Reacting to the charges of the BJP and the Shinde-camp that the previous Maha Vikas Aghadi government involving Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress was an “unnatural alliance”, Raut wanted to know whether the BJP-NCP tie up in 2019 was a “natural alliance” - a reference to the government of Fadnavis with NCP’s Ajit Pawar that lasted for just 80 hours.

“If the BJP-NCP alliance had continued, would it be called an unnatural alliance? There is nothing natural or unnatural in politics," Raut wrote in his weekly column - RokhThok - that appears in Saamana.

"A split was engineered in the Shiv Sena because Delhi realised Uddhav Thackeray can emerge as a national leader in future,” he said.