Poised for another term, CM Fadnavis set to make history

NEWDELHI: The Bharatiya Janata Party’s Devendra Fadnavis wasn’t a new name to Maharashtra politics, but his elevation as the chief minister in 2014 came as a surprise to many in the state and the national capital.

The 49-year-old politician, who won his fifth assembly election on Thursday, was chosen for the post over the claims of veterans like fellow Nagpur politician Nitin Gadkari and former minister Eknath Khadse. It was for the first in recent years that Maharashtra had a Brahmin chief minister. He retained the Nagpur South West, winning more than 56% of the votes.

Fadnavis had — and has — several advantages. His nonconfrontationist approach helped him assuage the hurt of the Marathas when the community campaigned for quotas in government jobs and college admissions. He wasn’t seen to be hostile to any particular social group and helped the BJP weave a rainbow coalition of castes.

His governance remained largely free of any major scandal, and any corruption charge surrounding a minister in his cabinet did not stick to him.

Fadnavis came from Nagpur and had strong backing from the leadership of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the ideological mentor of the BJP.

He was Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s choice for the chief minister’s post and this helped in neutralizing the opposition he faced in the CM’s office, initially from fellow BJP leaders.

Fadnavis is young and seen as someone who can be groomed for bigger roles in the future.

The election results on Thursday may be bittersweet for Fadnavis, who had raised the bar for himself by claiming that the BJP will attempt to get a majority (145 seats) on its own even when his party had fielded candidates in just 154 seats. But he still becomes the first sitting CM to lead his party to victory in the state since Vasantrao Naik.

There was not a significant dip in the BJP’s vote share compared to the last election, but Fadnavis missed his own target by miles.