Uddhav Thackeray Unfriends BJP: Shiv Sena to Go Solo in 2019 Lok Sabha Elections

Mumbai: The Shiv Sena will not contest the 2019 general elections and the state assembly elections in alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). A resolution to this effect was passed by the Uddhav Thackeray-led party at its national executive in Mumbai on Tuesday.

The Sena resolution, passed unanimously at the national executive presided by Uddhav Thackeray, says the party has always compromised for upholding alliance with the BJP.

The resolution was moved by Sena MP Sanjay Raut, who said the BJP had been demoralising the party for the last three years. "I moved the resolution for the Shiv Sena to fight the Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha polls on its own in 2019," Raut said.

He said the party will win at least 25 Lok Sabha seats (out of a total 48 in Maharashtra) and 125 Assembly seats (out of a total 288) in the state. "The BJP allied with the Sena in the name of Hindutva and the Sena kept patience for Hindutva. However, the BJP in the last three years has been demoralising the Sena and using power to do so," Raut said.

Shiv Sena has repeatedly criticised the Devendra Fadnavis government in the state and the NDA government in the Centre of various issues. ena, for the first time, had contested last yeaYuva Sena chief Aaditya Thackeray, while addressing a party event in December Ahmednagar, said it would come to power on its own in the state. “We will leave the government in a year and will come to power on our own. Party workers should start their preparations from now itself," Thackeray said, according to a report by news agency ANI.

Shiv Sena is the oldest alliance partner of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). The two parties came together to rule Maharashtra in mid-90s with Sena playing the dominant role in state politics. In the last Assembly elections, BJP pulled out of the alliance to emerge as the single largest party. Sena and NJP, however, cobbled an alliance after the polls to form the government with BJP bagging the CM’s post. The two parties also contested the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation Corporation (BMC) elections separately.

Sena had fared well in the BMC elections and was able to retain its hold in the country’s richest municipal body.