Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari on Thursday was denied permission to take the state government aircraft to visit Dehradun. Governor Koshyari was scheduled to visit Dehradun on Thursday by a state government aircraft. But when he reached the airport, he was reportedly informed that there was no permission for him to take the flight. The reasons why he was denied permission are unknown.
Unfazed, Maharashtra Governor Koshyari, who hails from Uttarakhand, and his aides immediately booked a scheduled commercial flight. He reportedly had to wait for over two hours before leaving for Dehradun.
This comes amid ongoing face-off between Uddhav Thackeray-led MVA government and Governor Koshyari on several issues, including appointments of 12 people as Members of the Legislative Council (MLC) through the governor’s quota.
On Wednesday, state Congress chief Nana Patole had said that the MVA government has decided to move the court over the ‘delay’ by the Governor in the appointment of nominated members to the Legislative Council.
Slamming the state government for not permitting the Governor to use the state flight services to fly to Dehradun, former Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis termed the MVA government as “egoist”, calling it a “black day” in the history of Maharashtra.
Speaking to reporters over the incident, BJP leader Fadnavis said, “This is very wrong because he is the governor of Maharashtra. As per the Constitution, the governor has the authority of appointing the Chief Minister and state ministers. There is a prescribed procedure if the governor wants to use the state flight services. The governor needs to send a request for the same which was already done in this case. The request went to the Chief secretary and chief minister but the governor was deliberately denied permission.”
Fadnavis further told the reporters that after the Maharashtra Governor had boarded the flight, he was informed about the denial of permission following which he had to deboard the flight, adding that he has never seen such an “egoistic government in his entire lifetime”.
“I want to tell the Maharashtra government that state flights are not private property. This is a black day in the history of Maharashtra,” he added.
According to a Raj Bhavan source the Governor is expected to attend the 122th IAS induction programme at Lal Shastri National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie, on Friday and he was supposed to fly in a government aircraft on Thursday morning to Dehradun and had planned to reach Mussoorie by road.
When the Governor reached Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport at 10 am, he was informed that the aircraft didn’t have the permission for take-off.