Mumbai: The Shiv Sena on Tuesday virtually signalled an exit from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA), saying it will contest all future elections, including the next general elections and Maharashtra assembly elections, alone.
Shiv Sena’s national executive, which met in Mumbai on Tuesday, unanimously adopted a political resolution saying it will contest all elections in the future on its own.
Later, addressing the national executive, party chief Uddhav Thackeray also announced that the Sena would contest assembly elections in all states on the issue of Hindutva to ensure that “genuine Hindutva” as against BJP’s “bogus Hindutva” assumes political power.
In a significant generational change, the Sena national executive also elevated 27-year-old Aaditya Thackeray, son of party president Uddhav Thackeray and currently chief of Sena’s youth wing Yuva Sena, as the party leader. The position of leader in Shiv Sena is next to the party president. The national executive also elevated four other senior leaders to this position, apart from Aaditya Thackeray.
The national executive also unanimously re-elected Uddhav Thackeray as the party president. Thackeray took charge as Paksha Pramukh (party chief) on 23 January 2013, nearly two months after Shiv Sena founder and chief Bal Thackeray died.
Later, addressing the party cadres, Uddhav Thackeray launched into a broadside against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP-led government of which the Sena is part at the centre and in Maharashtra. Thackeray said there was speculation about the general elections and Maharashtra assembly polls being advanced to December 2018 and asked the party cadres to be ready whenever they are held. The political resolution says the Shiv Sena on its own will win at least 25 of the 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra and win a majority in the 288-member Maharashtra assembly.
Attacking what he called the “continuously lying” BJP governments at the centre and in the state, Thackeray said the only alternative before the people of Maharashtra was a Shiv Sena government.
He particularly asked all those Shiv Sena leaders who have been elevated in the party hierarchy to fan out across the state and give him reports on their progress every three months. “These new appointments have been made to ensure that Shiv Sena’s bhagva (Sena’s saffron flag) is unfurled in Maharashtra,” he said.
Raising questions over “dragging Pakistan in Gujarat elections”, Thackeray said he was not happy about BJP’s decline or Congress party’s progress in Gujarat but added that if there was a third regional party, the voters in Gujarat would have voted it into power. The Shiv Sena contested 40 seats in Gujarat but all its nominees lost their deposit.
The relationship between the BJP and Shiv Sena, allies since mid-80s, has turned extremely bitter since 2014 when the BJP won power at the centre on its own under Modi and later emerged as the single-largest party, winning 122 seats in Maharashtra against Shiv Sena’s 63.
In the May 2014 general elections, the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance won 42 of 48 seats with the Sena winning 18. But in October 2014, the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance broke off and they contested the assembly polls against each other. In February 2017, it declared that the Sena would contest the municipal corporation polls, including those to the significant Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), on its own. The BJP, fighting under chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, gave a close fight to the Sena in Mumbai, and won 82 seats against Sena’s 84 in the 227-member BMC. The BJP also significantly bested Sena in all other cities, except Thane near Mumbai.
Meanwhile, Fadnavis, who is in Davos to attend the World Economic Forum summit, told news agency ANI that his government would complete its full five-year term till October 2019 and even get another term in office.
Reacting to Shiv Sena’s plans to go alone in all elections now, Fadnavis said: “Let’s wait, they have been saying many things. As of now we are in alliance in the government and this government will complete its term.”
