Prithviraj Chavan to stay, Congress says ‘new’ CM won’t have much time to work

NEW DELHI: Maharashtra CM Prithviraj Chavan seems to be safe for now as efforts to replace him have run into time constraints with the state election just a few months away.

“Removing Chavan will simply not help because there are just four months for the assembly polls and the poll model code of conduct would come into force in August,”said a Congress leader, explaining why the Congress is not replacing Chavan.

He added, “even if the Congress appoints a new chief minister, he would have only one month to work because cabinet reshuffle itself would take a month. “No decision happens quickly in our party, so there would be a lot of pulls and pressures on who should be made a minister and who should be kept out.

This usually takes a month. At the end of the day, the new CM would just get a month to work and nobody can do a miracle in that short a period,” said the Congress leader.

He, however, accepted there is a strong movement being run in Delhi against Chavan by some of his own cabinet ministers. However, a vary Congress leadership feels that people challenging Chavan could turn out to be worse than him.

It’s not just Congress ministers, but even party ally NCP that wants Chavan to be shifted out. The Sharad Pawar-led party believes that Chavan is behind attempts to discredit its leaders who have been embroiled in different scams.

The Congress party had plans to cut Chavan down to size by making former CM Ashok Chavan as the Maharashtra Congress Chief and giving him responsibility for leading the party to the state polls.

However, Congress is having a rethink on Ashok Chavan as he is embroiled in ‘paid news’ case that is being heard by the Election Commission.