Not without his deputy Devendra Fadnavis: Why Maharashtra CM Eknath Shinde put Ayodhya visit on hold

CM Eknath Shinde dropped his plan of attending the consecration ceremony of the idol at Ram temple in Ayodhya on Monday after he found out that his trusted colleague and deputy CM, Devendra Fadnavis, had not been invited for the historic event. Shinde has now declared that he, along with both the deputy CMs, the entire cabinet and all the legislators of Shiv Sena, NCP and BJP, will visit Ayodhya as per everyone's convenience.

As per a BJP leader, the temple trust had invited the heads of registered political parties as per the list provided by the EC-Shinde as the head of Shiv Sena, Ajit Pawar as the head of NCP, Uddhav Thackeray as the head of Shiv Sena (UBT), Prakash Ambedkar as the head of Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi and Sharad Pawar as the president of NCP. Since Fadnavis is not the head of BJP, he was not invited. The BJP leader said 8,000 persons from different walks of life have been invited for the event, which will be inaugurated by PM Narendra Modi in the presence of RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat.

Ever since the temple trust declared the date of the idol's consecration, there was immense curiosity over who would be invited from Maharashtra, and if, particularly, Sharad Pawar and Thackeray, both archrivals of Modi, would make the cut. All speculation was laid to rest when Sharad Pawar and Thackeray were invited; both, though, have declined the invitation.

Women bureaucrats overlooked, again & again

Veteran bureaucrat Sujata Saunik has once again missed the bus. After Manu Kumar Srivastava retired as the chief secretary on March 31 last year, it was expected that being the senior-most bureaucrat, Sujata would lead the state bureaucracy. But, CM Shinde chose her husband, Manoj Saunik, instead.

After Manoj's retirement on December 31, 2023, speculation was again rife that his wife would take over the reins, but that did not happen. Instead, Shinde appointed Nitin Kareer, an IAS officer of the 1988 batch. A section of bureaucrats tried to pacify Sujata, saying she still has a chance as Kareer will be in office only till March 31 this year and she will retire on June 30, 2025. But, Kareer can get a three-month extension in view of the Lok Sabha elections, and another three months owing to the assembly polls to be held later this year.

In the past, too, women bureaucrats were superseded. Chandra Iyengar, an IAS officer of the 1973 batch, lost the chief secretary post to J P Dange from the same batch. Medha Gadgil was superseded by D K Jain; although both belonged to the same 1983 IAS batch, Gadgil was a senior.