With the allocation of the portfolios announced, it is quite clear that Shiv Sena would have no significant influence over the functioning of the state government as NCP and the Congress have bagged all the important ministries.
Maharastra deputy chief minister and NCP leader Ajit Pawar has got the finance and planning development while another NCP leader Anil Deshmukh got the home department. Home and finance are most sought after portfolios, bagging these, NCP would be able to control all the major development projects and law and order of the state.
The NCP has bagged major portfolios- Finance, Water Resources, Home. Apart from these it has been allocated the Food and civil supplies, Housing, Health.
Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray has shown political immaturity by allocating finance and home portfolio to another party, as it would use these departments to steer the government. Uddhav will be reduced to a stamp, he would have no finance and no power. However, first-time Shiv Sena MLA and Aaditya Thackeray, has been allotted environment, tourism and protocol department. This would further ensure that Shiv Sena would only be incharge of clerical works.
The alliance seems to be in trouble as several MLA’s of Sena, Congress and NCP have expressed anger after not being included in the ministry. The greed of the MLA’s who were promised lucrative posts fearing defections is on the fore now as several MLAs have shown discontent over not being allotted a Cabinet berth.
NCP
- Ajit Pawar: Home Affairs
- Jayant Patil: Irrigation
- Chhagan Bhujbal: Food and Civil supplies
- Dilip Walse-Patil: Excise and labour
- Dhananjay Munde: Social justice
- Jitendra Awhad: Housing
- Rajesh Tope: Health
- Rajendra Shingne: Food and Drugs Administration
Shiv Sena
- Eknath Shinde: Urban development
Congress
- Balasaheb Thorat: Revenue department
- Ashok Chavan: Public Works department
- Nitin Raut: Energy
- Varsha Gaikwad: School education,
- Yashomati Thakur: Women and Child welfare
- KC Padvi: Tribal development
- Sunil Kedar: Dairy development
- Vijay Wadettiwar: OBC welfare
- Aslam Shaikh: Textiles & ports
- Amit Deshmukh – Health education and culture
The NCP has won big time, getting all the important portfolios while the Shiv Sena is a loser with departments such as forest, tourism, employment to name a few. Congress also has managed to gain few important departments.
Congress’ Balasaheb Thorat has bagged the powerful Revenue department while sena git horticulture department and higher and technical education. PWD, dairy, energy have also been allocated to the Congress.
The discontent among the leaders of the Sena would rise further as power- hungry NCP and Congress have bagged all the plum ministries. After receiving no powerful post in the government, Sena leaders would further exhibit their corporator mentality, which is responsible behind their greed for power. It was assumed the day this coalition was born that it is bound to fail due to the aspirations of three major parties and its leaders. The three parties- NCP, Congress and the Sena have very diverse political sphere however they opportunistically formed an alliance only to exclude BJP from coming to power.
With this, the Congress and NCP have outfoxed Uddhav- led Sena, reducing him to a stamp CM while they would rule the state. Sena would internally pay the price for not snatching powerful departments as its leader are jumping the sinking ship.