New Delhi: The three-day chief ministerial tenure of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Devendra Fadnavis has led to his joining the list of India’s CM with shortest tenures.
On Tuesday afternoon, Fadnavis, 49, resigned from his post, only three days after he made a dramatic comeback as the chief minister for a second term with the support of NCP leader Ajit Pawar, who had broken ranks with his parent party to lend support to the BJP.
Only Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa and former Uttar Pradesh CM Jagdambika Pal have had shorter tenures, at two days.
On May 17, 2018, Yeddyurappa had taken oath as chief minister and resigned on May 19 from his post after his party, the BJP, failed to get the requisite numbers to show majority ahead of the floor test in the Assembly.
Yediyurappa's two-day tenure as CM was his third stint as CM and he is back in the chair after the coalition government of the Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) collapsed following the resignation of 17 legislators in July this year.
Yediyurappa is the only chief minister in the history of Karnataka to have served in the position on four separate occasions.
Pal was the UP CM for two days, February 21, 1988 to February 23, 1988. He became the CM after the then governor Romesh Bhandari had sacked Kalyan Singh as CM and appointed Pal as his successor. Singh was reinstated as CM after he moved the Supreme Court which ordered a composite floor test that he won.
Once being the only second chief minister in Maharashtra to complete the full five-year term, Fadnavis now holds the dubious distinction of being the CM with the shortest tenure of three days in the last 59 years, a downhill journey which underlines the transient nature of politics.
However, what was supposed to be a dream run for Fadnavis came to an abrupt end in afternoon after Ajit Pawar stepped down as deputy CM, exposing the BJP's claim that it had majority in the 288-member Assembly.
Earlier, PK Sawant held the record of being the Maharashtra CM with the shortest term — from November 25 to December 4, 1963. He was made the caretaker chief minister after the death of his predecessor Marotrao Kannamwar.
Fadnavis' previous term as the chief minister lasted from October 31, 2014 to November 12, 2019, making him only the second CM after Vasantrao Naik of the Congress to last the full five-year term. The second tenure of Fadnavis lasted from November 23 to November 26, 2019.
The four-day-old BJP-led government collapsed on the eve of the supreme court-ordered floor test in the Assembly, after Ajit Pawar quit as deputy CM citing "personal reasons". Fadnavis too resigned while admitting that the BJP had lost majority in the House.
The collapse of the nascent government capped the month-long uncertainty in Maharashtra politics, which witnessed many twists and turns since the results of the assembly elections were declared on October 24.
Fadnavis remained CM till November 8, as the tenure of the 13th Legislative Assembly had ended. He submitted his resignation on November 8 and changed his twitter bio to "caretaker" chief minister of Maharashtra.
Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari on November 9 asked Fadnavis, the leader of the BJP's legislative wing, to indicate willingness and ability of his party to form government. The BJP won maximum 105 seats in the Assembly polls held last month.
However, as the BJP failed to muster numbers, the governor invited the Shiv Sena, the second largest bloc in the 288-member Assembly with 56 MLAs, to stake claim, and later the NCP. With no party having the requisite numbers, President's Rule was imposed in the state on November 12, which was lifted on November 23.
On that day, Fadnavis had changed his twitter bio to "Maharashtra's Sevak". He again changed the twitter bio to "caretaker CM of Maharashtra" on Tuesday, as no CM is in place right now.
Later in the evening, the governor convened a special session of the Assembly on November 27, where pro-tem speaker will administer oath to 288 newly-elected members and conduct floor test.
The 'Maha Vikas Aghadi' comprising the Shiv Sena, NCP and the Congress has claimed majority support of 162 MLAs in the House. The NCP has already announced that Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray is the chief ministerial candidate of new government.
(With inputs from PTI)
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