Prithviraj, Vasnik, Thorat in fray for Maha CM's post

Nov 09, 2010 |

mumbai

Tags:

Following Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan's submission of resignation to the governor on Tuesday in the wake of the Adarsh Housing Society scam, speculation is rife over his successor, with names of a few central and state party leaders doing the rounds.

Names of Maharashtra agriculture minister Balasaheb Thorat, Union ministers Prithviraj Chavan and Mukul Vasnik as well as Vilasrao Deshmukh are in the reckoning, Congress sources told PTI.

In case the high command vetoes Mr Vilasrao's candidature as his name also figured in the scam, he is all set to back Thorat, who enjoys clean image in the state politics, sources said.

Mr Thorat has been an MLA since 1985, a Cabinet minister for last 11 years, a staunch loyalist of Congress and Gandhi family and a leading figure in state co-operative movement.

Vasnik, senior Congress leader from Vidarbha region, has credentials of Gandhi family loyalist and confidante, a dalit, and also an organisation man with clean image, they said.

Congress observers including A.K. Antony are reaching Mumbai in the afternoon and will meet party legislators to gauge their opinions on the new CLP leader.

Names of Prithviraj Chavan, known as a staunch opponent of NCP chief Sharad Pawar in western Maharashtra, and Union minister Sushilkumar Shinde who is a dalit, are also being discussed.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/41199" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd></li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-95b309cbcc087034ce8ff68cae8c72f6" value="form-95b309cbcc087034ce8ff68cae8c72f6" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="86041767" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>