Ajit Pawar takes oath as Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister, Ashok Chavan gets cabinet rank

Senior NCP leader Ajit Pawar was sworn in as Maharashtra’s deputy chief minister on Monday (December 30), while former chief minister Ashok Chavan took oath as cabinet minister in the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maharashtra government.

Senior Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Ajit Pawar was sworn in as Maharashtra’s deputy chief minister on Monday (December 30). This is the second time that Pawar has taken oath as the deputy CM of Maharashtra in the last two months. Ajit Pawar is the nephew of NCP supremo Sharad Pawar and is an MLA from Baramati.

Former chief minister and Congress leader Ashok Chavan also took oath as cabinet minister in the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maharashtra government.

Shiv Sena MLA from Worli Aaditya Thackeray is also set to take oath as minister on Monday. Aaditya is likely to get either the Ministry of Higher Education or Ministry of Environment.

A total of 34 ministers - including those of Cabinet Minister and Minister of State ranks - will be administered oath of office and secrecy by Maharashtra Governor BS Koshyari at 1 PM in the Maharashtra Legislature precinct.

Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray has confirmed that 24 cabinet ministers and 10 Ministers of State will take oath on Monday. The leaders who will take oath as Cabinet ministers are: Ashok Chavan, Dilip Wase Patil, Dhananjay Munde, Vijay Waddettiiwar, Anil Deshmukh, Hasan Mushrif, Varsha Gaikwad, Rajendra Shingane, Nawab Malik, Rajesh Tope, Sunil Kedar, Sanjay Rathod, Gulab Patil, Anil Deshmukh, Dada Bhuse, Jitendra Awhad, Sandeep Bhumare, Balasaheb Patil, Yashomati Thakur, Anil Parab, Uday Samant, K C Padvi, Aslam Shaikh and Aaditya Thackeray.

The leaders who will be sworn in as Minister of State are Abdul Sattar, Bunty Patil, Shabhuraje Desai, Bachchu Kadu, Vishwajit Kadam, Dattaraye Bharne, Aditi Tatkare, Sanjay Bansode, Prajakt Tanpure and Rajendra Patil Pedrawarkar.

It may be recalled that Balasaheb Thorat and Nitin Raut of the Congress, Eknath Shinde and Subhash Desai of the Shiv Sena and Jayant Patil and Chhagan Bhujbal of the NCP took oath along with Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on November 28. As per the power-sharing formula agreement finalised by Shiv Sena, Congress and NCP, the Shiv Sena would have 16 ministers (apart from chief minister), NCP 14 and the Congress 12.