Congress-NCP-Shiv Sena pool their MLAs at Mumbai Hotel in show of strength

In a show of their strength, Congress-NCP and Shiv Sena pooled their MLAs at Hotel Grand Hyatt on Monday evening.

Senior leaders of three parties were present at the meeting Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, his son Aaditya Thackeray, Congress leaders including Mallikarjun Kharge and Ashok Chavan as well as NCP supremo Sharad Pawar gathered at the hotel.

Chants of "Long live Maha Vikas Aghadi" filled the hall where the MLAs of three parties assembled.Earlier in the day, NCP legislative party leader Jayant Patil along with Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde, Congress leader Prithviraj Chavan and others visited Raj Bhavan and gave a letter showing the strength of 162 MLAs to the officials at Raj Bhavan.

On Sunday evening, all NCP MLAs were moved to hotel Hyatt citing security concerns.After which Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut invited Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari to "come and watch" the show of strength of the three parties.

"We are all one and together, watch our 162 together for the first time at Grand Hyatt at 7 pm, come and watch yourself @maha_governor," Raut tweeted.

The Supreme Court earlier today reserved the order on a joint petition filed by Shiv Sena, Congress and NCP against the decision of Koshyari to invite BJP to form government in the state.

The petitions were filed after BJP's Devendra Fadnavis took oath for the second consecutive term as the state Chief Minister, with NCP's Ajit Pawar as his Deputy Chief Minister on Saturday morning. This came when deliberations among Congress, NCP and Shiv Sena on the government formation had reached the final stage.

The order on whether the floor test will be conducted for proving the majority of the BJP-led Fadnavis government is expected to be pronounced at 10:30 am tomorrow.

A bench of Justices N V Ramana, Ashok Bhushan, and Sanjiv Khanna today heard the arguments put forth by counsels appearing for Governor, Maharashtra BJP and other parties.