Picture : Twitter/ ANI
The much-awaited expansion of the Maharashtra cabinet took place on Tuesday with a total of 18 MLAs — nine each from the Bharatiya Janata Party and from the Chief Minister Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena faction sworn-in as ministers in a grand ceremony in Mumbai’s Raj Bhavan. Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari administered the oath of office to 18 MLAs as ministers.
Cabinet expansion took place today. Starting today, they will work full-fledged & take up the responsibility of their respective depts. The rest of the cabinet still remains (to be formed). It’s a small cabinet, the rest of the cabinet still remains (to be formed) , Chief Minister Eknath Shinde told ANI
As per PTI report, The cabinet expansion comes over 40 days after Chief Minister Shinde and Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis were sworn in after a rebellion led by the former toppled the Uddhav Thackeray led Maha Vikas Aghadi-government in the state.
The BJP MLAs set to get cabinet berths include Chandrakant Patil, Sudhir Mungantiwar, Girish Mahajan, Suresh Khade, Radha Krishna Vikhe Patil, Ravindra Chavhan, Mangal Prabhat Lodha, Vijaykumar Gavit and Atul Save.
Leaders from Shiv Sena inducted include Dada Bhuse, Shambhuraje Desai, Sandeepan Bhumre, Uday Samant, Tanaji Sawant, Abdul Sattar, Deepak Kesarkar, Gulabrao Patil and Sanjay Rathod.
MLAs of the Eknath Shinde camp arrived at Sahyadri Guest House in Mumbai on Tuesday morning to attend a meeting.
On June 30, Shinde took oath as Maharashtra Chief Minister and Devendra Fadnavis his deputy.
