Maharashtra Cabinet recommends CM Thackeray as Guv's pick to state council amid COVID-19

After being chosen as Maharashtra Chief Minister, Shiv Sena Supremo Uddhav Thackeray on Thursday has been nominated to the Maharashtra Legislative council by Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari. Informing the cabinet decision, state minority affairs minister Nawab Malik said that the decision was done as the current MLC polls were postponed due to Coronavirus (COVID-19) spread in the state. Currently, there are 1335 cases in Maharashtra, of which 714 cases are from Mumbai itself.

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Thackeray nominated to Legislative Council

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Uddhav sworn-in as CM

The Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, who is the first member of the Thackeray clan to hold a Chief ministerial position took oath on November 30. While he was not elected to the Assembly, he was unanimously selected as the Maha Vikas Aghadi leader and won the floor test by garnering 169 seats. Inspite of being nominated to the Council by the governor, he will have to be re-elected to the Council by June, when two council seats will fall vacant. These two seats were vacated as those members were elected in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

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Maharashtra under lockdown

On March 14, the Thackeray government invoked the Epidemic Diseases Act declaring the Coronavirus as an epidemic - declaring all gyms, swimming pools, malls, theatres, pubs shut in Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Thane, Nagpur, Pimpri-Chinchwad till March 31 amid the rising cases of Coronavirus. With the railways shutting down its services on March 22 marking 'Janta Curfew', the Maharashtra government extended a state-wide curfew, stopping all transport services across districts. After PM Modi announcing a 21-day lockdown, Maharashtra too enforced the same, mulling to extend the lockdown as the state has seen the highest cases in the nation.

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