Maharashtra: Ajit Pawar swears in as Deputy CM, Aaditya Thackeray gets cabinet rank

MUMBAI: NCP leader Ajit Pawar on Monday sworn in as the deputy chief minister of Maharashtra. Shiv Sena leader Aaditya Thackeray also got a cabinet rank thereby becoming the first from his family to hold a cabinet position.

Aditya Thackeray is Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray's son and the first member of the Thackeray clan to have contested and entered the Assembly. Ajit Pawar is the nephew of NCP supremo Sharad Pawar and had briefly broken away to join hands with the BJP to form the shortlived Devendra Fadnavis government.

It was Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari who administered the oath to the ministers.

36 ministers have been inducted in Monday's expansion. It must be noted that Uddhav Thackeray was sworn in as Chief Minister of a coalition comprising the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress parties, known as Maha Vikas Aghadi on November 28.

Other prominent members who took oath on Monday are former Chief Minister Ashok Chavan from Congress, Dilip Walse Patil, Dhananjay Munde, Anil Deshmukh, Hasan Mushrif, Dr. Rajendra Shingne from NCP, Vijay Vadettivar and Varsha Gaikwad from Congress.

Earlier, when the Shiv Sena and BJP had been allies and fought the assembly elections, Aditya Thackeray had been projected as the Deputy Chief Minister. However, when the alliance broke and Shiv Sena tied up with the NCP and Congress to form the Maha Vikas Aghadi government, his father Uddhav Thackeray became the Chief Minister.

Ajit Pawar, who was the Deputy Chief Minister in the shortlived Fadnavis government, has since returned to the NCP fold and it was widely believed that he would be rehabilitated.