Maharashtra CLP leaves CM choice to Sonia

The Congress Legislature Party (CLP) in Maharashtra on Tuesday night passed a resolution authorising party president Sonia Gandhi to elect a new chief minister for the state.

The new chief minister will replace outgoing Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan whose resignation for his alleged involvement in the Adarsh housing scam was accepted in the morning.

Sushil Kumar Shinde and Prithviraj Chauhan, who is Minister of State for Science and Technology and the Prime Minister’s Office, are front runners for the post of Maharashtra Chief Minister now.

The CLP met for an hour in Mumbai to choose a leader who would be the chief minister and later decided to leave the selection to Sonia Gandhi.

Hours after the party accepted the resignation of Chavan over the Kargil war widows’ housing scam, All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary Rahul Gandhi said the successor to the post should be someone ?capable?.

?The next Maharashtra Chief Minister should be someone who is clean, capable and can deliver,? Gandhi told reporters here.

Meanwhile, Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said Chavan?s resignation was based on ?general perceptions?.

?Whatever has been done, was done after considering all aspects. So there is no question of whether the decision was ?right or wrong??.there?s has been no wrong delivery,? Mukherjee told reporters here.

?I am not sitting on a harrow judgement. It was not a regular inquiry committee. We went through certain reports and general perceptions. Decisions are often taken based on perceptions and certain facts,? he added.

Mukherjee and Defence Minister A K Antony were sent to Mumbai after the Congress top brass went into a huddle in New Delhi.

The report into the scam by central Pranab Mukherjee and A K Antony, appointed by Congress to probe the issue, was also submitted to the party president earlier.

The acceptance of the resignation makes it easier for the Congress to defend themselves in the winter session of Parliament.

“Pending inquiry, Chavan’s offer of resignation has been accepted. He has been asked to tender his resignation to Governor K Sankaranarayanan,” Congress general secretary Janardhan Dwivedi said in a statement.

Sucked into the controversy over allotment of flats in the Adarsh Cooperative Housing Society meant for Kargil War heroes’ families to a clutch of bureaucrats and politicians in Mumbai, Ashok Chavan had offered to resign from his post before Congress supremo Sonia Gandhi earlier, but the decision was kept a bay in view of the visit of the US President.

The 30-storey apartment, housing many top level defence officials, was built on a disputed army land at Colaba and the flats meant for the families of the Kargil martyrs were allotted to top defence officials and kins of politicians.