In Team Uddhav vs Shinde Camp, Sena Foundation Day Is Latest Flashpoint

For the first time after the Shiv Sena split last year, the factions led by Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and his predecessor Uddhav Thackeray will celebrate the party's foundation day at separate events in Mumbai today.

With both factions are going all out with the celebrations as they seek to project themselves as the "true inheritors" of party founder Bal Thackeray's legacy ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha and Maharashtra assembly elections.

While the Shinde-led Shiv Sena has organised its event in Goregaon in northwest Mumbai, the Shiv Sena (UBT)'s celebrations will be held at Sion in central Mumbai.

In June last year, Eknath Shinde - then a minister of the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government - rebelled against his boss and toppled the Maha Vikas Aghadi  coalition government of the Sena, NCP and Congress with the support of 39 other party MLAs. 

Mr Shinde then became Chief Minister with the BJP's Devendra Fadnavis as his Deputy. The Election Commission of India subsequently granted his faction the original party name and its 'bow and arrow' symbol. The Thackeray group was named Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray).

Shiv Sena MP Shrikant Shinde, the son of Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, said party workers from across the state will gather for his faction's event, news agency PTI reported.

Sena (UBT) mouthpiece 'Saamana' on Sunday said that Uddhav Thackeray will address the party conclave in Worli in south-central Mumbai, the Assembly seat of his son and former minister Aaditya Thackeray.

Aaditya Thackeray and senior Sena leader Subhash Desai will inaugurate the conclave. A film on the work done by Uddhav Thackeray during his tenure as chief minister will also be screened, a report in the Saamana said.

Ambadas Danve, the Leader of Opposition in the Maharashtra Legislative Council, and Sanjay Raut, a Rajya Sabha member, will also address party workers at the conclave.

Bal Thackeray, a political cartoonist, founded the Shiv Sena on June 19, 1966, and made the pride of 'Marathi manoos' (Marathi speakers in Mumbai) the core plank of its politics.

Ahead of the Maharashtra election as well as the long-due civic polls in Mumbai, the event is likely to witness a verbal duel with both factions trying to outdo each other in establishing their unit as the real Shiv Sena.