In a crucial development on Wednesday, Maharashtra Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar delivered a significant verdict, affirming Chief Minister Eknath Shinde’s faction as the legitimate Shiv Sena. This ruling, which comes after the Supreme Court set a deadline for Narwekar to address long-standing petitions from rival Sena factions, secures the ruling coalition’s stability in Maharashtra.
Eknath Shinde vs Shiv Sena
Narwekar’s decision not to disqualify any faction’s lawmakers preserves the existing balance in the Maharashtra assembly and ensures the continued tenure of Chief Minister Shinde. The battle for control of the Sena, with potential implications for ongoing disputes within the Nationalist Congress Party and future party schisms, is now set to move to the apex court.
Narwekar emphasized that the 10th schedule of the Constitution couldn’t be invoked to suppress intraparty dissent and indiscipline. He rejected the demand to disqualify Shinde and his 38 lawmakers but also dismissed the Shinde faction’s plea to disqualify 14 members of the Thackeray faction, citing technical flaws. Narwekar noted that the disqualification pleas from the Thackeray faction were submitted through an unknown cell phone number instead of Sena whip Bharat Gogawale.
This ruling ignited a political controversy, with former Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray denouncing it as a “murder of democracy” and expressing his intent to challenge it in the Supreme Court. Conversely, Shinde welcomed the decision, highlighting his commitment to preserving internal party democracy and resisting compromises for political gains.
The Sena underwent a vertical split in 2022 when Shinde and 39 legislators departed from the party, then led by Uddhav Thackeray, and aligned with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to establish the government. The intricacies of this internal power struggle will now unfold in the Supreme Court as the political landscape awaits further legal proceedings.
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