Prominent OBC leader Chhagan Bhujbal was on Friday named as the Deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra by the Sharad Pawar-led NCP.

Bhujbal, besides taking charge of Deputy CM’s post will have an additional responsibility of Home Ministry.

"Our state legislature party has decided that Chhagan Bhujbal will be the leader," NCP supremo Sarad Pawar said.

Bhujbal succeeds RR Patil, who had quit owning moral responsibility for the Mumbai terror attacks.

Maharashtra chief minister-designate Ashok Chavan said that the security of his state would be his "top priority".

"The aam aadmi (common man) is not concerned with who is chief minister or the deputy chief minister. They just want the administration to be strong," Chavan, the son of former union home minister S. B. Chavan, said.

He said, "I will do everything to strengthen the state police force so that carnages of the kind that occurred last week were not repeated."

Ashok Chavan, Industry minister in the Vilasrao Deshmukh government and son of former Maharashtra chief minister SB Chavan seems to be the frontrunner in the race to the CM post in Maharashtra.

He is believed to have outrun revenue minister Narayan Rane even though Rane, who was the CM during the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance government in the late nineties, lobbied hard in a spirit of do-or-die.

Other contenders comprised Balasaheb Vikhe-Patil, MP and sugar baron and Union ministers Sushilkumar Shinde and Prithviraj Chavan.

Mumbai, Dec. 5 : Chhagan Bhujbal will be the new Deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra.

Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) Chief Sharad Pawar named Bhujbal for the post today.

"Our state legislature party has decided that Chhagan Bhujbal will be the leader," Pawar said.

Bhujbal will take over from R R Patil, who resigned from the chair after taking moral responsibility for the Mumbai terror attack.

Bhujbal (61),last held the post in the Congress-NCP allied Government which came into power in Maharashtra in 1999.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, who last month completed four years of his second term in the office, resigned on Thursday.

"I have accepted moral responsibility for Mumbai terror attacks. In a democracy one has to honour people's anguish and anger," he said after submitting his resignation.

The 63-year-old Deshmukh drove to Raj Bhawan and submitted his resignation to Governor S C Jamir, soon after he addressed a press conference.

Opposition parties in Maharashtra have welcomed the exit of Vilasrao Deshmukh as Chief Minister.

They have alleged that he was a non-performer.

"Deshmukh was non-serious and he was also a non-performer. We are not sad to see him go because of the way he handled Mumbai terror attacks," BJP state unit president Nitin Gadkari said.

"Deshmukh's resignation won't do as the entire government had "failed" on all fronts and needed to be dismissed," said Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly and senior Shiv Sena leader Ramdas Kadam.