To be or not to be with BJP, Shiv Sena leaving Maharashtra confused

The Shiv Sena has gone back to its usual tactic of playing the role of the opposition despite being in the Maharashtra government.

This comes just after Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Mumbai to inaugurate key projects and shared the dais with Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray.

Modi was in Mumbai on Saturday, where he performed bhoomipujan for the Chhatrapati Shivaji Memorial in the Arabian Sea, which is set to cost Rs 3,600 crore and the statue, it is said, will be higher than the Statue of Liberty. Modi also announced city projects such as new metro lines and elevated railway. 

Just a day after this, the Shiv Sena raised questions on the BJP, while commenting on the upcoming UP elections. The party suggested that the BJP should not be overconfident that it would win the crucial state elections and stayed firm in its stand on demonetisation.

Uddhav also met the farmers who are likely to lose their land to pave the way for the Mumbai-Nagpur expressway - a pet project of Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis. He promised the farmers that if the government tried to acquire their land, he would stand by them.

Obviously, the BJP is baffled, even hurt, by ally Shiv Sena’s tactics. On its part, the BJP, for Modi’s inauguration programme on Saturday, gave Uddhav the status of special invitee on the insistence of Fadnavis. This was after Sena leaders threatened that if Uddhav was not given due respect at the function, the party would boycott the event.

Modi, however, did not lose the chance to snub Uddhav on the dais despite Fadnavis’s best efforts to create amity. The PM did not bother to reply to Uddhav’s demands, and instead went on to criticise those who were opposing the demonetisation drive (which includes the Shiv Sena).

It is no secret that Uddhav personally and Shiv Sena as a whole are not happy with the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance in Maharashtra, while on the other hand, a “new” BJP under Modi is not ready to give the Sena the importance it enjoyed in the past. 

Many BJP leaders were opposed to making Uddhav part of the Saturday inauguration ceremony as the Sena had in the past opposed the city metro project, while the late party chief Bal Thackeray was against the Shivaji memorial, calling it wastage of money.

Uddhav wanted to be part of Saturday’s event as the Sena was worried about the BJP taking credit for it and attracting voters for the upcoming municipal corporation elections - which are also termed as semi-assembly elections - in Mumbai, Pune, Nasik and Nagpur, which comprise the major chunk of the state’s 41 per cent urban population.

While Uddhav wanted the Sena’s presence to be felt in the inauguration ceremony, things didn’t really turn out like that as many of the party workers could not get a place inside the MMRDA ground where the inauguration ceremony took place.

And as usual, sloganeering started between the two parties in front of PM Modi during the inauguration - something that has been happening for the past few months and even recently at the inauguration of the new railway station Ram Mandir in Mumbai. 

People in the know reveal that Uddhav is not at all happy being part of the alliance with BJP because the Shiv Sena has been sidelined both in the state and at the Centre during important decisions and BJP has got all the credit.

Even if CM Fadnavis is trying to have cordial relations with the Thackerays, it is not helping as many Sena leaders and MLAs are complaining that their issues are not being addressed by the government and they are rather being suppressed by the BJP leadership, despite the Shiv Sena being part of the state government.

Therefore, whenever he gets the chance, Uddhav targets the BJP and sometimes even PM Modi on issues such as demonetisation, terrorist attacks in Kashmir, the much hyped surgical strikes and so on. All this just to keep the Sena’s opposition space intact.

Many in the Shiv Sena have suggested that Uddhav should break the alliance with the BJP government but sources in the BJP claim that he is caught in a Catch-22 situation - if he does disengage, some of his leaders may defect from the party.

So despite having 63 MLAs and 19 MPs, Uddhav is neither able to enjoy nuisance value as the opposition nor is he able to enjoy being part of the state government – clearly, it’s a case of “so near yet so far” - till the time he is ready to take the risk and break away from the alliance.

Also read: Why Uddhav still needs Bal Thackeray