Wounded Sena faces a fight for lost turf

The Sena cadre is hopeful right now, especially after the landslide victory during the Lok Sabha elections. Additionally, party members on the ground are garnering public support by creating a sympathy wave following party supremo Bal Thackeray’s death in 2012, and weaving in their campaign negative publicity for the BJP, blaming the party for rupturing the alliance.

A part of Sena’s strategy is to strike at the BJP’s advertising. In fact, though Sena leaders say they had nothing to do with the social media campaign that effectively rubbished the BJP’s ‘Kuthe neun thevlay Maharashtra majha?’ punchline, the cadres admit they were behind it.

“People are angry that everywhere the BJP is talking about Maharashtra as if it is a very backward state. The Shiv Sena is only criticizing the way the Congress-NCP government has handled the state for so long. Moreover, Marathi voters are very angry with the way the BJP has tackled matters. In the face of an anti-incumbency wave when voters needed a strong option for change, which the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance was, the party deserted us for its own selfish motives. We see this anger when we go door-to-door in our campaigns,” says Ajay Choudhari, who has led the Sena’s branch in the Parel, Lalbaug, Sewri and Worli areas, which have a strong Marathi population. Choudhari is for the first time contesting the election from the Sewri Assembly constituency for the Shiv Sena.

In Thane too, the Sena is banking on the voters’ anger towards the BJP for forcing the split. “In Thane Lok Sabha constituency, 70 per cent of the voting population is Maharashtrian and the rest 30 per cent is divided between other communities. When BJP wanted support, it formed alliance with the Sena. It was because of Balasaheb Thackeray and Sena that BJP got power. Now when their Acche dinn (Good times) has come, they broke the alliance. This has angered the Marathi voters who will all vote for the Shiv Sena. This time, we will create history by winning with a thumping majority and BJP will come to us to form an alliance again,” says Pratap Sarnaik, the Shiv Sena MLA from Ovala-Majiwada.

During its alliance years, the Sena contested around 20 of Mumbai’s 36 seats, leaving those with a large population of Gujaratis and south Indians to the BJP. In the 2009 Assembly elections, the Sena contested 23 out of 36 seats, but emerged victorious in just four – Dahisar, Goregaon, Jogeshwari and Bandra East. The Sena’s fortresses of Parel, Dadar and Mahim for over three decades collapsed under the might of the then nascent MNS. In 11 seats, the MNS prevented Shiv Sena candidates from winning by splitting the Marathi vote.

In Thane too, the 2009 Assembly elections were a setback for the Sena with the NCP gaining ground there with MNS acting as a spoiler. It won only five of the 12 seats it contested there. Of the seats that the Sena lost, the NCP, MNS and the Samajwadi Party picked up two seats each, while an Independent won the seventh. The NCP also won two of the six seats contested by BJP in the saffron alliance.

Rahul Shewale, Shiv Sena MP from the Mumbai South Central, says that besides retaining the four Assembly constituencies that the party currently holds, it is also confident of adding seats such as Vile Parle, Sewri, Mahim, Sion-Koliwada, Dharavi, Anushakti Nagar, Ghatkopar West, Mulund and Andheri East to its tally.
According to senior party leaders, the Shiv Sena seems to have now set its eyes on bagging at least 20-22 of the 36 seats in Mumbai and 14 of the 18 seats in the Thane region.

Mumbai South:

The parliamentary constituency has six Assembly constituencies – Worli, Sewri, Byculla, Malabar Hill, Mumbadevi and Colaba. Of these, Worli and Sewri, the seat that was earlier called Parel, were the Shiv Sena bastion for years till NCP’s Sachin Ahir dislodged the party from Worli and MNS’ Bala Nandgaonkar won the Sewri seat. Choudhari says, “In the 2009 Assembly polls, MNS showed people dreams of youth awakening, jobs, new development. People tried a new product advertised in the market, but that influence is now over. We won in this area during corporation elections.” From Worli, the Sena has fielded Sunil Shinde, the local corporator.

Mumbai South Central:

The LS seat includes Mahim, Dharavi, Sion-Koliwada and Wadala. Mahim is perhaps the most prestigious seat for the Shiv Sena, being home to its headquarters Sena Bhavan. However, MNS has been systematically eating into the Sena base since the 2009 polls. Shiv Sena has fielded a senior leader and a known face Sada Sarvankar, who had defected to the Congress during the previous Assembly elections aftedr being denied a ticket. Interestingly, he was defeated by MNS’s Nitin Sardesai, a close aide of Raj Thackeray, who will once again be Sarvankar’s prime competition on October 15. The BJP has fielded a debutant candidate, a mill worker’s son and a native of Dadar. Along with Mahim, the Shiv Sena is fiercely targeting Dharavi, a Congress stronghold for nearly three decades it broke into just once for a five-year term in the state polls. From here, Sena has fielded Baburao Mane, who had got it this seat once. Mane is pitted against Congress’s Varsha Gaikwad and BJP’s debutant Divya Dhole, who quit her job with a multi-national firm to contest election.

Mumbai North East:

While Ghatkopar East, Ghatkopar West and Mulund have been the BJP’s strength, Mankhurd Shivajinagar, dominated by Muslims, is a struggle between the Samajwadi Party and Congress. Shiv Sena is focusing its energies on Bhandup and Vikhroli. The party has fielded a corporator from the ward, Ashok Patil, to wrest the constituency from MNS’s Shishir Shinde. In 2009, Sena’s Sunil Raut, who is now the party’s candidate from Vikhroli, was a close third after MNS and NCP. In Vikhroli too, Sena’s Dattaram Dalvi stood third after MNS’ Mangesh Sangle and NCP.

Thane:

The sprawling constituency, which comprises six Assembly segments, is shared equally by NCP and Shiv Sena. While Mira Bhayandar, Airoli and Belapur have NCP MLAs Gilbert Mendonca, Sandeep Naik and Ganesh Naik, respectively, Ovala-Majiwada, Kopri-Pachpakdi and Thane are represented by Sena’s Pratap Sarnaik, Eknath Shinde and Rajan Vichare, the last one now an MP. “We will not only win in Ovala-Majiwada, Kopri-Pachpakdi and Thane, but will take back Mira Bhayandar, Airoli and Belapur from NCP.”

Kalyan:

This parliamentary constituency, which came into existence after the delimitation in 2009, had been a Sena stronghold for years. It has a diverse voter profile comprising Marathi-speaking agri community, Brahmins, Muslims, south Indians, Sindhis and north Indians. Despite Sena MLA Ekanth Shinde’s strong control in the Kalyan-Dombivli pocket, his party managed to win only one (Ambarnath) of the six Assembly seats in the constituency. However, after the victory of Dr Shrikant Shinde, Eknath Shinde’s son, from Kalyan in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the Sena is now hopeful of winning five of the six seats including two that the BJP had bagged in 2009. “BJP won those two seats due to the efforts of Shiv Sainiks. If Sena would have contested from those two seats, it would have won. We have nothing to worry. Sena is winning five of the six seats,” Shinde says.

Bhiwandi:

Assembly seats in two major pockets here — Bhiwandi East and Bhiwandi West — are held by the Samajwadi Party, while two others — Bhiwandi Rural and Kalyan West – are divided between the BJP and MNS. The constituency, dominated by Muslim voters, is a strong pocket of the Samajwadi Party.