All eyes on Supreme Court today: Hearing on NCP-Sena-Congress plea over Maharashtra govt formation at 11:30 AM

The Supreme Court on Sunday is set to hear the urgent petition filed by Congress-NCP-Shiv Sena against Maharashta governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari's move regarding government formation in the state when he decided to swear in BJPs Devendra Fadnavis as the Chief Minister. A Bench, comprising justices NV Ramana, Ashok Bhushan and Sanjiv Khanna will take the matter up for hearing at around 11:30 AM, according to reports.

Fadnavis on Saturday took oath as Maharashtra Chief Minister for his second term, and NCP's Ajit Pawar took oath as deputy chief minister. The oath was administered by Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari at Raj Bhawan.

The NCP-Shiv Sena-Congress alleged in their plea that the invite sent to form the government to Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar was 'illegal', and sought quashing of the same. It also demanded an immediate floor test to avoid "further horse-trading" and a direction to the Maharashtra Governor to invite them to form the government under the leadership of Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, saying they have the support of more than 144 MLAs.

Ever since Maharashtra results were announced on October 24, reports were doing the rounds that there will be a Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress government. However, the three parties were working on the common minimum programme but had not reached to any conclusion.

NCP Chief made it clear on Friday that Congress and NCP wanted Uddhav Thackeray to be the Chief Minister if Sena-NCP-Congress government was formed in the state. Saturday came as a surprise when Devendra Fadnavis and Aji Pawar took oath as Chief Minister and Deputy CM.

After taking the oath, Devendra Fadnavis said, "People had given us a clear mandate but Shiv Sena tried to ally with other parties after results, as a result, President's rule was imposed. Maharashtra needed a stable government and not a 'khichdi' government."

His deputy Ajit Pawar said, "From result day to this day no party was able to form the government, Maharashtra was facing many problems including farmer issues, so we decided to form a stable government."

BJP and Shiv Sena fought the elections together and had a comfortable majority to form the government but the two parties didn't reach any consensus on the '50-50 formula' that led to the break-up of ties.

Shiv Sena has 56 seats in the Maharashtra Assembly, way below the half-way mark of 144, it needed both the NCP's 54 and Congress' 44 legislators to reach the magic number.

President's rule was imposed on Maharashtra after no party was able to form the government even 20 days after assembly election results which were declared on October 24.