Winter session is a farce, says Devendra Fadnavis

Nagpur: Former chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on Sunday dubbed the winter session of the state Legislative Assembly a ‘farce’.

The Uddhav Thackeray-led government has not completed the allocation of portfolios to ministers and the current allocation of portfolios is temporary, he said.

The BJP leader said that the new government came to power over two weeks ago but “no official portfolio allocation has been done so far”.

“The current allocation of ministerial portfolios is temporary. Therefore, this winter session is nothing but a farce,” he said, adding that the government is not serious about this session.

Mr Fadnavis, who is the Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the Vidhan Sabha, alleged that the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government was spreading ‘misinformation’ about the state’s financial condition, which he said was ‘better’ than other states.

“There were some loans obtained outside the budget, but it has been shown as part of the budget and the amount of outstanding loan has been inflated. I think this information is being spread to postpone some critical decisions in future,” Mr Fadnavis said.

He further claimed that the government was juggling with figures by clubbing budgetary loans with non-budgetary loans.”

“Maharashtra’s financial condition is better than other states. The government, without any reason, is blaming the financial condition of the state to run away from its responsibility,” he said.

The Leader of Opposition in the Vidhan Sabha also demanded that the government disburse '23,000 crore to farmers for waiving their outstanding dues.

“Thackeray, and the NCP and Congress earlier demanded disbursement of '23,000 crore. Now it is time for them to implement it,” Mr Fadnavis said.

In a dramatic midnight political coup, Mr Fadnavis had been sworn-in as the chief minister along with Ajit Pawar, who took oath as the deputy chief minister, on November 23. But both leaders resigned just 80 hours later.