- Monday, February 24, 2025
By: Shubham Ghosh
IN an interesting turn of events, India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has reached out to Raj Thackeray, a firebrand leader from the western state of Maharashtra, as a move to counter his estranged cousin Uddhav Thackeray of the Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) in the general elections starting April 19.
On Tuesday (19), Thackeray, who heads Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), met home minister Amit Shah and the BJP’s national secretary Vinod Tawde, a former lawmaker in the state, in New Delhi. Political circles are abuzz with speculation that the BJP may form a tie-up with MNS in a bid to eat into Sena (UBT)’s votes in Mumbai, the capital of Maharashtra, and its major electoral base.
If the alliance goes through, Thackeray’s MNS, which will also see a return from political oblivion, might get to contest in one seat from Mumbai.
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In February, a delegation of the MNS, which Thackeray floated in 2006 after pulling out of the undivided Shiv Sena formed by the later Maharashtra leader Bal Thackeray in the 1960s, met the state’s deputy chief minister, Devendra Fadnavis. It is said that Raj was disappointed with his uncle Bal Thackeray’s efforts to promote son Uddhav as his successor.
Read: India national polls to kick off on April 19; results on June 4
The MNS has no presence in the Lok Sabha or Lower House of the Indian parliament while it has just one representative in the state assembly of Maharashtra. The party, which was once seen as an outfit with potential with Raj often dubbed as the true successor to his uncle, has not been able to make much of a mark in Maharashtra politics.
In the previous Lok Sabha election, Raj Thackeray played a completely different role when he was a strong critic of prime minister Narendra Modi and Shah and even campaigned for the opposition while fielding no candidate of his own. It will be interesting to mention here that Thackeray himself was in favour of Modi becoming the PM in 2014.
Raj Thackeray’s style of politics has often come under the scanner, especially his crusade against people of north India who come to Maharashtra for livelihood. The MNS has been often accused of doing muscle-power politics and many feel it has gone against it in elections.
In the past, the MNS had played a spoilsport for the Shiv Sena by polarising its Marathi vote bank and the BJP top brass is perhaps thinking of joining hands with Raj Thackeray to reduce Uddhav Thackeray’s chances in the state in the 2024 elections.
In Maharashtra, the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (Maharashtra Development Front) comprises Uddhav Thackeray’s Shiv Sena (UBT), the Indian National Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar), the Sharad Pawar faction of the Nationalist Congress Party.
The NCP (SP) on Tuesday said Raj Thackeray’s meeting with Shah was not astonishing as there were indications of the MNS chief’s closeness to the BJP.
Thackeray has been under the scanner of central agencies and he has been trying to save his party, NCP (SP) spokesperson Clyde Crasto claimed.
The fortunes of Thackeray’s MNS have been dwindling and the meeting could salvage him and protect his party, the leader of further claimed.
“It is not astonishing that he met Union minister Amit Shah as there were enough indications of his closeness to the BJP,” Crasto said.
(With PTI inputs)
