Maharashtra Govt’s Fate To Be Decided On Wednesday, Suspense Builds Up

Wednesday, 10 January 2024, will be perhaps one of the most important days in Maharashtra’s history as state legislative assembly speaker Rahul Narvekar is scheduled to deliver his verdict on the disqualification petitions against chief minister Eknath Shinde and his several supporters. Narvekar has indicated that only highlights of the 500-page judgement will be read out tomorrow at 4 pm in Vidhan Bhavan and the detailed verdict will be available later. Even as suspense is building up about the fate of the three-party government in the state, Shinde and deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis have expressed confidence that the petitions will be rejected by the speaker. Shinde said he had the majority, which was the main test in a democracy. Moreover, the Election Commission had recognised his side as the ‘real’ Shiv Sena and hence he was hopeful that justice will prevail. On the other hand, Sena’s rival faction chief Uddhav Thackeray and NCP president Sharad Pawar have taken grave objections for two meetings Narvekar had with Shinde at the latter’s official residence over the past week. “It is highly suspicious that the judge is calling on the accused,” Uddhav told the media on Tuesday while Pawar felt that it would have been better if Narvekar had not met the CM in this situation. While 34 petitions have been filed in the matter, over three lakh pages of various documents had to be perused, Narvekar has revealed.