Mumbai: Following Maharashtra Speaker Rahul Narwekar’s decision to recognise the Eknath Shinde-led faction of the Shiv Sena as the real Shiv Sena, the rival Uddhav Thackeray faction is returning to the party’s core base — its Marathi voters — projecting the move as one that hurts Marathi pride.
The Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) is emphasising how Narwekar’s verdict is a major injustice to the Marathi manoos (Marathi people) and aimed to benefit a Gujarati lobby.
Speaking to reporters after the decision Wednesday, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader and Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Raut said, “Doing this with Balasaheb Thackeray’s Shiv Sena, attempting to reduce it to dust is like stabbing the Marathi manoos on the back…It was the BJP’s dream for many years to remove Balasaheb Thackeray and his Shiv Sena from Maharashtra’s soil.”
Referring to Narwekar, a BJP MLA, Raut further said that this “dream of the Gujarat lobby” is now being “fulfilled by a Marathi person sitting on a constitutional post”.
Eknath Shinde had rebelled against the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena in June 2022 along with 39 other MLAs, causing a vertical split in the party and toppling the Uddhav-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government comprising the undivided Shiv Sena, undivided Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Congress.
The Shinde faction then joined the BJP to form a government with Shinde as chief minister. The two factions issued disqualification petitions against each other. The Supreme Court had in May last year put the ball in the Speaker’s court to decide on the disqualification petitions.
On Wednesday, Narwekar pronounced his order, declaring the Shinde-led Shiv Sena to be the real party, based on its legislative strength. In February last year, the Election Commission had also recognised the Shinde faction to be the real Shiv Sena on the same basis. The Speaker also quashed disqualification petitions filed by both sides against each other.
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Shiv Sena and Marathi voters
Bal Thackeray formed the Shiv Sena in 1966 primarily to represent the sons of the soil, who he alleged were losing out on opportunities to migrants in Mumbai.
While the party also adopted a broader Hindutva agenda in 1985, the Marathi voters — especially from the Mumbai and Thane region — remained the party’s key electorate on the basis of which Shiv Sena won successive elections to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation and Thane Municipal Corporation. The civic bodies have been under an administrator since March 2022 as the term of the general bodies lapsed.
“The Marathi manoos sentiment is still very strong. It exists and is as powerful as it used to be. But Uddhav Thackeray has to convince that voter that he represents the Marathi manoos in the real sense of the term,” Vaibhav Purandare, author of Bal Thackeray and the rise of the Shiv Sena told ThePrint.
Purandare further said that the Shinde-led Shiv Sena will likely counter the Shiv Sena (UBT)’s overtures to the Marathi manoos by questioning how the Marathi population dwindled in Mumbai despite the undivided Shiv Sena being in power in the Mumbai civic body for more than two decades.
Manisha Kayande, a leader who defected from the Uddhav faction to the Shinde-led Shiv Sena in June last year, criticised the Shiv Sena (UBT) for turning this verdict into a Marathi versus Gujarati narrative.
“Are the 40 MLAs in our faction not Marathi? On the other hand, they made leaders like Priyanka Chaturvedi an MP overlooking so many other Marathi members of the party,” Kayande said.
She added, “Where have they through the Mumbai civic body been able to give justice to the Marathi population of Mumbai? Under Balasaheb it happened, but after Uddhav Thackeray took over the reins of the party, what has happened? The Marathi manoos has only been thrown out of Mumbai.”
‘Marathi manoos versus Gujarat lobby’
Many have staked claim to this Marathi voter base over the last two decades. The Raj Thackeray-led Maharahtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) has made inroads, and the BJP has also tried to cultivate this vote bank with promises of infrastructure development and events such as Marathi dandiya.
Since the split in the Shiv Sena in 2022, the Shinde-led party has emerged as another claimant on this voter base cultivated under Bal Thackeray’s leadership, and Narwekar’s verdict upholding it as the real Shiv Sena further gives it heft.
The Shiv Sena (UBT) has been attempting to tighten its hold on the Marathi electorate from time to time, mainly by questioning the alleged drain of big-ticket investments from Maharashtra to Gujarat under the Shinde-led government.
Speaking to ThePrint, political commentator Hemant Desai said the Shiv Sena (UBT) has no option but to return to its core voter base at this point with just a few months to go for the Lok Sabha and assembly elections this year.
“The Hindutva voter base has gone to the BJP because of the Ram temple issue and to a certain extent also because of the fact that the Shiv Sena (UBT) is part of the Maha Vikas Aghadi. Going back to the core voter base also helps it tap the sentiment around Balasaheb Thackeray and attempt to gain the confidence of the Shiv Sena voters in its fight with the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena,” he said.
(Edited by Gitanjali Das)
Also Read: Why Maharashtra speaker declared Shinde faction the real Sena — ‘Legislative strength only aspect’