Shiv Sena goes ‘solo’ with two candidates

Mumbai: Following its resolution to go ‘solo’ in the upcoming polls, the Shiv Sena has announced the nomination of Narendra Darade and Rajeev Sable for legislative council polls for Nashik and Konkan, respectively. The candidates were declared without any kind of consultation with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The polls will take place on May 21 and the candidates will be elected from the local bodies.

Elections will be held in Raigad-Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg, Nashik, Wardha-Chandrapur-Gadchiroli, Parbhani-Hingoli-Amravati, Osmanabad and Beed-Latur constituencies where members of councils and zilla parishads will exercise their franchise. The term of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)’s Sunil Tatkare and Jayant Jadhav, the Congress’ Abdullah Khan Latif Khan Durani and Dilip Deshmukh and the BJP’s Mitesh Bhangadia and Pravin Pote are set to expire.

The Sena declared the names of the two candidates late on Thursday after an internal discussion in the party. The party did not initiate any dialogue with the BJP on the issue but went ahead with their own candidates. “The party has already taken the decision of contesting the polls alone. The decision is as per the resolution and hence Uddhavji has approved the names,” a Sena leader said.

The Sena has a good presence in the Konkan, Nashik and Marathwada region, which will damage the BJP’s prospects. Also if the Congress-NCP put up an alliance candidate, then the BJP might be in trouble.

The rift between the two parties has widened in the past few months over several issues. The latest disagreement was on the Nanar refinery project. The Sena has opposed the project in the Konkan region whereas the BJP has firmly backed it. Mr Thackeray had even lashed out at the BJP on several other decisions and expressed its unhappiness over the government’s performance.

Recently, Uddhav took a dig at chief minister Devendra Fadnavis saying that the state needs a full time home minister to handle the law and order situation.