Uddhav Thackeray announced in his Republic Day address that his party will never form an alliance with the BJP again and will fight the BMC polls alone, thus paving the way for the Shiv Sena to lose their last bastion: – the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporations.
During the days of the late Balasaheb Thackeray, BJP and the SS used to be inseparable allies, it is sad to see the two parties who used to be “natural allies” breaking up the alliance, all thanks to Shri Uddhav Thackeray. As the BMC polls are now less than a month away, there was little time left for the BJP-SS to stitch up a last-minute alliance. The INC and the NCP also decided to go alone in the BMC polls thus making the polls a four-cornered constancy doesn’t have much presence in Mumbai (it bagged only 13 seats in the last BMC polls) and the Congress is mired in widespread factionalism between Gurudas Kamath and Sanjay Nirupam, the stage is set up perfectly for the BJP to sweep the BMC polls.
Riding high on the Demonetisation drive and ably led by Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis, the BJP surprised one and all in the recently held local body polls across Maharashtra and emerged as the clear winner in the first and the second phase of the polls which were held after the demonetisation drive. The BJP made huge inroads into the traditional vote base of the NCP and the INC. What was surprising that the rural areas who were supposedly worst affected by the demonetisation drive voted overwhelmingly for the BJP.
In the first phase of the polls Bhartiya Janata Party won a whopping 851 seats out of 3,705 seats spread over 147 municipal councils that went to polls. INC and NCP stood second and third bagging 643 & 638 respectively. But there was one clear loser. The Shiv Sena bagged only 514 seats. In the second phase, too, the BJP won comprehensively winning 5 out of the 14 municipal bodies and the SS lost big again. The important thing to note is that this polls were fought by the BJP and the Shiv Sena in an alliance.
The Shiv Sena finished fourth behind the BJP, NCP &even the INC in all the phases despite being in an alliance with the BJP, which emerged as the single largest party in the polls. It doesn’t require a psephologist to deduce the fate of the Shiv Sena in the upcoming BMC polls in which the party is fighting alone. After being defeated in the assembly elections held in 2014 in which the BJP emerged as the single largest party and the subsequent drubbing in the local body polls it seems like Uddhav Thackeray has not learned his lessons and is refusing to accept the reality of BJP, once the junior partner of the SS in Maharashtra is now emerging as the senior partner. The cash rich BMC which is ruled by the SS-BJP-RPI combine and has the Shiv Sena as the senior partner due to the seat sharing arithmetic in 2012. The BMC which is facing charges of widespread corruption and the anti-incumbency wave due to the 15 year hold of the BMC by the Shiv Sena is certainly going to hit the Shiv Sena the most. The Shiv Sena had more to gain from an alliance with the BJP who is riding high on the demonetisation drive and the good image of its CM Devendra Fadnavis. Uddhav.
Thackeray drowned in his arrogance and his lust for power seems to have gone on a self-destruct mode. From criticizing every move of the Prime Minister, abusing the Bhartiya Janata Party in their editorial mouthpiece ‘Saamna’ and to sitting on the opposition benches in the legislature assembly where it is a part of the Government, the Shiv Sena seems to have completely lost its way.
The BJP which is on a roll across India would have no qualms in fighting the cash rich BMC elections alone especially with a divided opposition which would lead to the minority vote getting divided between the INC, NCP and AIMIM. An alliance with the Shiv Sena would have made the party privy to the anti-incumbency wave and the corruption charges faced by the Shiv Sena.
On the other hand, an alliance with the BJP would have smoothened out to an extent the impact of the anti-incumbency wave faced by the Shiv Sena. Despite the best efforts of Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis and Mumbai Bhartiya Janata Party chief Ashish Shelar to form an alliance of the two right wing parties, the Sena led by Uddhav Thackeray humiliated the BJP in the seat sharing talks. From sending junior leaders to the talks to offering BJP just 60 out of 227 seats, Uddhav Thackeray left no stone unturned to humiliate the BJP. Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis who has been given a free hand in Maharashtra by the higher ups in the BJP has almost single handedly made the BJP a force throughout the state. His developmental work akin to PM Modi and the strength of the BJP in urban areas throughout the country has made the BJP frontrunners for the BMC polls.
In “Mood of the Nation” survey conducted by the India TV group predicted the BJP led NDA (of which at present the SS is a part of) to bag 350 seats if the parliamentary elections were held today giving the saffron Party a humongous vote share of 42% and reducing the Congress led UPA to just 60 seats. No sane person would reject an alliance with the BJP at present unless it’s of course Shri Uddhav Thackeray whose own party is facing an existential crisis. Shri Uddhav Thackeray and his party are now capable of showcasing their bravado only in their editorial mouthpiece ‘Saamna’ where they often like to abuse PM Modi. The BMC is the last meaningful post the Shiv Sena holds and it would be sad to see a party which was once led by the great Balasaheb Thackeray and once took the notorious D-company head on and eradicated the fear of the Underworld from the streets of Mumbai, face an existential crisis after the February 21 BMC polls.