39 ministers included in Devendra Fadnavis-led Maharashtra cabinet

Protests have broken out in pockets by supporters of some of the leaders - especially in Yeola by supporters of Chaggan Bhujbal.

Of the three constituents of the ruling alliance, Ajit Pawar's faction of the Nationalist Congress Party has dropped five of its key leaders including Chhagan Bhujbal, Dharmarao Baba Atram, Sanjay Bansode, Dilip Walse Patil and Anil Patil.

The  BJP and Eknath Shinde's Shiv Sena have dropped three each.

The BJP has dropped Ravindra Chavan, Sudhir Mungantiwar, and Vijaykumar Gavit while the Sena has kept out Tanaji Sawant, Abdul Sattar, and Deepak Kesarkar.

Chhagan Bhujbal has openly declared that he will no longer attend the assembly session and will return to Nashik, saying he has been disappointed.

He also said that even as he was offered a Rajya Sabha seat, he won't be accepting it now as that will "not be fair" to the voters of Yeola.

The other big leader dropped is Sudhir Mungantiwar, who has contradicted Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis's claim that he was dropped after a "long discussion".

"We had a long discussion with Sudhir Mungantiwar on the expansion of the cabinet. If he does not get a ministerial berth, there is a possibility that he will be given some big responsibility by the party," Fadnavis had said.

Mungantiwar, however, refuted the claim, saying Devendra Fadnavis did not have a long discussion with him about the ministerial post.

Fadnavis and state BJP chief Chandrashekhar Bawankule had said that his name was on the list of ministers the day before the cabinet expansion, but it turned out otherwise, he claimed.

Several others who were apparently in the running for a cabinet berth also ended up empty-handed.

The Sena especially is facing backlash, with one of its MLAs, Narendra Bhondekar, having already quit party posts.