Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole on Friday expressed his discontent on the appointment of Shiv Sena’s Ambadas Danve as the Leader of Opposition in the state Legislative Council. Patole gave a severe warning mentioning that the alliance with Sena is “not natural and permanent”, and further expressed that the ties were made “in a different situation”.

Shiv Sena recently gave the Lop position to Danve in the Legislative Council. However, the move didn’t land well with its allies in the state. Patole further announced that the step was taken with his party’s consent. 

“The post of LoP in the Legislative Council has been given to the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), while the post of Vice President of the Council has been given to Shiv Sena. So, we were of the view that Congress should get this (Council LoP) post. But the decision has been taken without taking us into consideration. We will take up the issue,” he revealed.

.Patole further went on to reveal that Congress is “ready to talk” to Shiv Sena on this issue.”We are ready to talk and go ahead. If they (Shiv Sena) don’t want to talk, it is their concern. We had an alliance with them in a different situation. This is not our natural or permanent alliance,” Patole announced.

The Congress state chief, Patole further lashed out at Eknath Shinde and Devendra Fadnavis-led new government in Maharashtra and called out their formation root. Patole said it was formed “using the central agencies and funds” while further announcing that this government would not last long.

“The cabinet expansion took place 39 days after the government was formed. Maharashtra has a tradition that portfolios are allotted immediately. But now, they are yet to be decided, which shows the fight for plum ministries is there,” said Patole.

However, on Tuesday the much-awaited expansion of the newly formed Maharashtra Cabinet took place. A total of 18 MLAs– 9 each from the Bharatiya Janata Party and the rest 9 from the Shinde-led Shiv Sena faction took vow as ministers in a grand ceremony, which was held at Mumbai’s Raj Bhavan.

The Cabinet expansion was done after more than 40 days of government formation under Chief Minister Shinde and Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis took place. The government formation was done following a rebellion fraction led by Shinde toppled the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi-government in the state.

The BJP MLAs who were sworn as ministers include– Chandrakant Patil, Sudhir Mungantiwar, Girish Mahajan, Suresh Khade, Radha Krishna Vikhe Patil, Ravindra Chavhan, Mangal Prabhat Lodha, Vijaykumar Gavit, and Atul Save.

Meanwhile, Shiv Sena– Dada Bhuse, Shambhuraje Desai, Sandeepan Bhumre, Uday Samant, Tanaji Sawant, Abdul Sattar, Deepak Kesarkar, Gulabrao Patil, and Sanjay Rathod were inducted in the government.

On June 28, Devendra Fadnavis met Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari and gave a proposal to him for a floor test. The next day, Uddhav Thackeray sent his resignation to the Governor as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra. 

(With inputs from ANI)