The Chief Minister of Maharashtra Devendra Fadnavis and his Deputy Ajit Pawar, who took oath for their  respective offices last Saturday, had resigned from their posts on Tuesday, hours after the Supreme court had delivered its verdict to conduct a trust vote in the state's legislative assembly on Wednesday amidst the political standoff in the state.

The month-long political turmoil was heated on last Saturday after the BJP had tuned in fresh twists in the drama where the party presented the early morning surprise to the country after Devendra Fadnavis took oath as the Chief Minister and NCP's leader Ajit Pawar sworn in as the Deputy Chief Minister of the state by stunning the tri-party alliance of Congress, NCP and Shiv Sena. By calling the swearing-in ceremony as a murder for democracy, the tri-party had approached the Supreme court seeking the trust vote in the assembly to avoid the horse-trading of the MLAs on Saturday.

Through their petition, they had accused the decision of the Governor on inviting Fadnavis to form the government as unconstitutional and illegal. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who represented the Central government, had argued that Devendra Fadnavis has the support of nearly 170 MLAs - BJP, NCP, and Independent MLAs and stated that there is no urgent requirement for hearing the case in the Supreme court. After the hearing, the apex court bench comprising of Justices N V Ramana, Ashok Bhushan, and Sanjiv Khanna had reserved the final verdict on Tuesday.

While delivering the verdict on Tuesday, the Supreme court had observed that this case has been lying under the situation on calling the court to maintain the democratic values and to facilitate the citizens' right to good governance and the bench tabled the four conditions to conduct the floor test on November 27th, 2019. In its directive, the Supreme court had noted that the trust vote becomes mandatory to determine whether the Chief Minister has the majority support in the assembly.

Hours after the verdict was pronounced, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and his Deputy Ajit Pawar had resigned from their offices nearly four days after taking the oath. Maharashtra state governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari had named Kalidas Kolambkar, the BJP MLA as Interim speaker who will be administering the oath for the MLAs on Wednesday before tabling the trust vote in the assembly.

Also read: https://thenewstuff.in/mahas-tale-heated-arguments-apex-court-while-ruckus-parliament