He was administered the oath of secrecy by governor Dr P C Alexander at Raj Bhavan in the afternoon.

The session of the Upper House begins from tomorrow. The post of the chairman of the State Legislative Council had fallen vacant as Jayantrao Tilak, who was at the helm for several years, retired recently.

The swearing-in ceremony was held in Pune as the governor is camping in the city. Chief Minister Manohar Joshi, Deputy Chief Minister Gopinath Munde, Legislative Affairs Minister Leeladhar Dake, MLAs Dilip Kamble, Deepak Paigude and MLC Prakash Devale were present on the occasion.

Senior officials including secretary to the Chief Minister, Arun Bongirwar, Pune Divisional Commissioner Arun Bhatia, Municipal Commissioner Rajiv Agarwal, Police Commissioner K K Kashyap, District Collector Vijaykumar Gautam and chief executive officer of the Pune Zilla Parishad Munir Mujawar were also present.

After the swearing-in ceremony, the Chief Minister left for Mumbai by a government plane.