In a significant development, NCP chief Sharad Pawar said on Wednesday that his party "will no longer support" the ruling BJP-Shiv Sena combine in the state.
Earlier, the Nationalist Congress Party had extended legislative support to the government citing the need for political stability. Not any more, Pawar told the media.
"After observing their performance, the NCP will no longer support this government. One of the allies, the Shiv Sena itself is now destablising the coalition," he said.
The NCP president predicted that in view of the internal differences bogging down the ruling coalition, the state government may not last long.
Pawar said it was laughable how the Shiv Sena was asking the Bharatiya Janata Party and its Chief Minister Fadnavis to get out of their own government.
He was referring to Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut's ultimatum on Tuesday to the BJP. Raut, the official spokesperson of the Sena, lashed out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his comments on the Sena-enforced cancellation of the Ghulam Ali concert and his calling as "unfortunate" the incident where BJP thinker Sudheendra Kulkarni was smeared with black ink for being part of the launch of a book by former Pakistan External Affairs Minister K M Kaduri.
Raut said the Prime Minister's image was made because of the violence that happened after Godhra and that it was unfortunate that Modi had called the ink-smearing incident 'unfortunate'.
Pawar said "The government is led by Fadnavis and the Sena is asking them to get out. This is laughable. Both will continue to hurl abuses at each other in the name of self-pride and dignity. This show will go on but none will dare quit the government."
Meanwhile, in an interview to IBNLive on Wednesday, Sanjay Raut claimed that no ultimatum had been issued to the BJP but the Sena was in talks with the BJP and any final decision on the ties between the two parties would be taken by his party chief Uddhav Thackeray.
There are also reports saying that the BJP has opened a line of communication with NCP leaders Sharad Pawar and Praful Patel in the hope of keeping ready a stop-gap arrangement if the alliance with the Shiv Sena ends.
