The dramatic political developments that unfolded in Maharashtra in the second fortnight of November, leading to the swearing-in of the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena-Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)-Congress government on the evening of November 28, reflected multiple trends in contemporary Indian politics which are bound to have substantive short- and medium-term implications. Their long-term impact depends on the manner in which the political players from different sides respond to and engage with them.
Indeed, the early acts of the political drama were on show immediately after the announcement of the elections to the State Assembly on October 24, when the Shiv Sena reminded its senior pre-election partner, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), about the 50:50 power-sharing formula that was agreed upon way back in May 2019. It was the political jousting on this demand that prevented the formation of a Ministry for nearly a month after the announcement of the results. But the twists, turns and aggravation that the political drama acquired between November 22 and 28 were such that it brought to the fore many facets of Indian democracy, from the despicable and deplorable political machinations, blatantly undermining constitutional morality and misusing various offices of power, including that of the topmost administrative functionaries of the country and the State, to the noteworthy interventions by sections of the judiciary to the spirited resistance put up by one of the senior-most opposition leaders of the country, NCP president Sharad Pawar, to the subversion of democratic norms and systems.
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