At What Point Does SS(UBT) Begin To Ask Itself: Why Are We Still In MVA?

The Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) (SS(UBT)) will contest at least 85 seats in the election for the 288-member Maharashtra assembly next month.

The party is part of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar) (NCP(SP)) as its other constituents.

On 23 October, the MVA announced that the three parties had reached an agreement on 255 of the 288 assembly seats in Maharashtra, with each party contesting 85. Discussions on the other 33 are ongoing at the time of writing this.

In 2019, the Shiv Sena, then undivided, had contested 126 seats as part of the Mahayuti in Maharashtra, along with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and other smaller outfits. 

The Shiv Sena’s switching over to the Congress-NCP alliance and its split two years down the line is a story for more than one book and does not bear repeating here.

Here, we would only briefly explore the question: at what point does the SS(UBT) begin to question its participation in the MVA?

The reason for Uddhav Thackeray taking his Shiv Sena out of the Mahayuti in 2019 was his insistence on Sena getting the chief minister’s chair. This was after the BJP had secured almost twice as many seats as the Sena. 

Thackeray claimed that before the assembly election, the then BJP president, Amit Shah, had promised them the same in a closed-door meeting. A claim the BJP continues to reject vehemently. 

Thackeray walked out of the alliance, joined hands with NCP and Congress, who were only happy to make him the CM and keep the BJP out. 

However, this time around, there has been no assurance from the Congress and NCP that it will be Thackeray himself (or some other leader from the SS(UBT)) who will be made the chief minister. 

At the moment, thus, Thackeray’s position can be summed up in the following points:

1. Walked out of Mahayuti on the question of CMship; five years later, no assurance on the same by MVA either. 

2. Party split. 

3. Party name and symbol went to Eknath Shinde. 

4. Post-split, party critically dependent on core Congress and NCP votes to secure electoral wins. 

5. Charges of dilution of party ideology and forsaking Balasaheb Thackeray’s legacy

Now imagine for a moment that the MVA is not able to secure a majority in the assembly election coming up in five weeks. Surely, the SS(UBT) cadre, leaders, and maybe even Thackeray himself would introspect on whether the switch over to the Congress’ side has been a net gain or loss, and if they decide it was a loss, whether it's then time to cut their losses. 

It’s possible that such debates are happening within the SS(UBT) even now, but in the scenario where the MVA loses, the probability that they come out in the open is higher.

But even if SS(UBT) is not pleased with where it stands, what can it do? 

While nothing is impossible in politics, especially in Maharashtra, the likelihood of Shinde’s Shiv Sena and BJP welcoming SS(UBT) back into the Mahayuti are minimal. What makes it worse for Thackeray are speculations that this might be the last election that the BJP contests in an alliance in Maharashtra. From the next time onwards, that is, 2029, the party is expected to go it alone. 

Further, there is another scenario that can push the SS(UBT) into an existential dilemma: what if the MVA does secure a majority but the chief minister is not from the SS(UBT)? 

Even as the Congress is non-committal on the chief ministerial candidate, its senior leader and former Maharashtra CM, Prithviraj Chavan, said at a party event on 30 September that the next Maharashtra chief minister will be from the Congress.

The the best-case scenario for the SS(UBT) appears to be its only way out: the MVA secures a majority in the Maharashtra assembly and both Congress and NCP(SP) agree to give the chief minister’s post to Thackeray’s party.

Even this, though, may only delay and not rule out the inevitable for Thackeray — the Congress and NCP(SP) crowding out his party from the political space in Maharashtra.