Ajit Pawar likely to be next Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister

Nationalist
Congress Party (NCP) leader Ajit Pawar is set to pull off a remarkable comeback
by returning as deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra after his dramatic
betrayal last month, before the Uddhav Thackeray government came to power.

Ajit Pawar,
the nephew of NCP chief Sharad Pawar, is likely to take oath on December 30,
this time as part of the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress government.

Senior NCP
leaders said the all-important Home Department may go to the party’s Dilip
Walse Patil, while Mr. Pawar could be again appointed Deputy Chief Minister
along with charge of two more ministries.

“Any
expansion of the MVA government is not possible without including Mr. Ajit
Pawar in it. He will definitely be a part of the extended Cabinet of the MVA,”
said senior NCP leader and Cabinet Minister Jayant Patil.

Mr. Pawar
was earlier sworn in as Deputy Chief Minister along with the Bharatiya Janata
Party’s (BJP) Devendra Fadnavis as Chief Minister on November 23. However, Mr.
Pawar had, in a surprising turn of events, resigned from the government in less
than 80 hours, resulting in the fall of the BJP-led government.