MUMBAI:
The Shiv Sena on Tuesday announced that it would contest the 2019 state and Lok Sabha elections on its own, and elevated Uddhav Thackeray’s son Aaditya in its hierarchy to make him a part of the core team.
Party spokesperson Sanjay Raut made the announcement. The Shiv Sena national executive, which met at the NSCI in Worli on the birth anniversary of their late founder Bal Thackeray, passed a resolution that the party would contest the 2019 Lok Sabha and Maharashtra Assembly polls solo.
The decision comes amid increasingly strained relations with its ally, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). For a while now, the Sena chief has been taking on the BJP and even Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis — with whom he is said to share a good personal rapport — on several issues.
At Tuesday’s meeting, the other important action taken was the elevation of Yuva Sena chief Aaditya Thackeray to a Shiv Sena ‘neta’. The party hierarchy has Uddhav Thackeray at the top, followed by ‘netas’ (leaders), then ‘upnetas’ (deputy leaders). This means that Aaditya will now be a part of the Sena’s core leadership team.
Recently, Aaditya had announced that the Sena would quit the BJP-led Maharashtra government in a year’s time.
As Yuva Sena chief, Aaditya has taken up several causes in Mumbai. For instance, the recently opened 11-km cycling track is his brainchild. He also spearheaded the drive to ban plastic in Maharashtra and has been pushing for the Sena-held state transport department to promote eco-friendly public transport vehicles.
