Amit Shah congratulates Fadnavis, Ajit Pawar on becoming Maharashtra CM, Deputy CM

Home Minister Amit Shah on Saturday congratulated BJP's Devendra Fadnavis and NCP's Ajit Pawar on taking oath as the Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra respectively.

Shah also said that the new government is committed to ensuring the development and welfare of the state.

"Heartiest congratulations to Shri @Dev_Fadnavis ji on taking oath as Chief Minister of Maharashtra and Shri @AjitPawarSpeaks as Deputy Chief Minister of the state. I am confident that this government is committed to the development and welfare of Maharashtra and will set new standards of progress in the state," Shah, who is also BJP president, tweeted in Hindi.

In a major development, Fadnavis earlier this morning took oath as the Chief Minister for the second consecutive term while Pawar took oath as the Deputy Chief Minister of the state.

The oath was administered by Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari to Fadnavis and Pawar at Raj Bhawan.

The move came at a time when deliberations between Congress, NCP and Shiv Sena on government formation had seemingly reached the final stage on Friday.

Earlier, NCP supremo Sharad Pawar had claimed that there was a consensus on Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray as Chief Minister of the alliance government.

The BJP, which emerged as the single largest party in last month's assembly elections, could not stake claim to form a government as its ally Shiv Sena remained firm on rotating the Chief Minister's post and equal sharing of Cabinet berths.

Shiv Sena parted ways with BJP to explore ways to form a government. It, however, failed to prove the support of the required number of MLAs in the time given by Koshyari.

The Governor had then invited NCP, the third-largest party, to prove its ability to form the government failing which President's Rule was imposed in the state.

The BJP won 105 seats in the 288-member assembly followed by Shiv Sena 56, NCP 54 and Congress 44.