Devendra Fadnavis speaks to the press after being elected leader of Legislative Party.
Devendra Fadnavis, a 44-year-old four-term legislator from Nagpur, will be the BJP's first Maharashtra chief minister.
The party's legislators unanimously elected Mr Fadnavis as their leader in Mumbai today. He met Governor Ch Vidyasagar Rao in the evening to stake claim to form the government.
"The Governor has invited us to form the government, we have to prove our majority within 15 days," Mr Fadnavis later told reporters.
On Friday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will watch as Mr Fadnavis and a small cabinet of ministers, all from the BJP, are sworn in at a grand ceremony at Mumbai's famous Wankhede Stadium.
"There are many people in the Maharashtra BJP who are capable of taking this responsibility and yet they chose me," Mr Fadnavis said, thanking the BJP legislators he now leads. He also thanked Prime Minister Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah crediting them with the party's performance in the elections.
Mr Fadnavis, who will be Maharashtra's second youngest chief minister, was the front-runner ever since the BJP posted its best performance ever in the state earlier this month, but has kept a low profile through bouts of political muscle flexing by other leaders, including union minister and Mr Fadnavis' one-time mentor Nitin Gadkari, whose supporters wanted him to be chief minister.
Mr Modi and Mr Shah have put aside caste and other considerations in picking the non-Maratha leader - Mr Fadnavis is a Brahmin - from Nagpur.
Devendra Fadnavis is seen to have scored with a very clean image, high energy and much hard work that he has done as the BJP's Maharashtra chief. But he has superceded several senior BJP leaders in the state and has the delicate task of keeping them in good humour.
Sources say Mr Fadnavis will take oath on Friday with only about six to nine ministers and a cabinet expansion will happen later.
The BJP is 22 seats short of a majority in the 288 member Assembly, but top leaders say it is comfortable with its government being in a minority to start with and will not rush negotiations with former ally, the Shiv Sena, for a renewal of their partnership, called off just before the elections.