Ahead of the crucial Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) elections, Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray has urged party leaders to focus on direct outreach with citizens across Mumbai.
According to Shiv Sena (UBT) sources, while addressing party leaders and workers, Thackeray stated that it was time local leaders went door to door to connect with citizens and remind them what Shiv Sena has done for Mumbai. “Uddhav saheb has instructed us to attempt to connect with every citizen of the city and explain how Shiv Sena (UBT) has contributed to the development of the city, and how they [the ruling Mahayuti, comprising the BJP, Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena and Ajit Pawar-led NCP] are trying to erase this legacy,” said a party leader who attended the meeting.
On Sunday, a closed-door meeting was held at Shiv Sena Bhavan, the party headquarters, in Mumbai, where Thackeray interacted with party workers and leaders such as Vibhag Pramukhs, Upvibhag Pramukhs and Shaka Pramukhs and even held a separate meeting for the party’s women`s wing. Emphasising the importance of focusing on retaining control of the BMC, Thackeray, citing defections, told party workers and leaders that loyalty should be prioritised above personal or monetary gain.
The BMC was scheduled to go to the polls in early 2022, but there have been no elections to the constituencies of 227 corporators as a case related to the OBC reservation issue is being heard in court. However, last month, the Supreme Court directed the Maharashtra government to conduct polls within four months.
For nearly 25 years, the undivided Sena and BJP had been allies who ruled the civic body. But in 2017, the BJP and the undivided Sena contested the civic polls separately. The undivided Shiv Sena won 84 of the seats, while the BJP managed to bag 82 seats, a massive jump from its 2012 tally of 51. However, after a split engineered in 2022 by Eknath Shinde, the UBT camp has weakened. Such is the situation that of its 84 elected corporators, 43 joined the Shinde camp. This will be the first civic election since the Sena split.
In such a scenario, this civic election is a do-or-die battle for the UBT camp, especially when the Shinde Sena is flexing its muscle in Mumbai and even the BJP has set a target of ‘Mission 150’ for the BMC polls. During the Assembly elections conducted in 2024, of the 21 seats the UBT contested in Mumbai, it won 10. It had 14 MLAs in 2019.
