GUWAHATI: Assam Minister Ashok Singhal arrived at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Guwahati, Assam on Saturday night to meet the rebel MLAs of Maharashtra, including Shiv Sena’s Eknath Shinde. The political crisis in Maharashtra seems to be slowly tilting in favor of rebel Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde, with four more party MLAs arriving in Guwahati on Thursday and joining others who have been camping at a five-star hotel in the city since Wednesday. Huh. Notably, Eknath Shinde claims that he has the support of 38 of the 55 Shiv Sena MLAs, which is more than two-thirds of the party’s strength in the 288-member Maharashtra Assembly. This means they can either quit and form another political party or merge with another without being disqualified from the state assembly.
However, Shiv Sena MP Arvind Sawant claimed that some rebel MLAs had accompanied him to Assam. Eknath Shinde Many people want to come back due to pressure and fear. He said, “Some of them (rebel MLAs) left because of pressure and fear, so they were taken so far to Assam. Many MLAs are calling us that they want to come back. It is the misfortune of Maharashtra when there is unemployment. And inflation, some people are only worried about coming to power. Without Shiv Sena chief, they (rebel MLAs) cannot be present, no one will ask them,” Sawant told ANI.
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Earlier on Saturday, rebel MLA Chimanrao Patil on Saturday expressed dissatisfaction over Shiv Sena’s alliance with its “traditional rival” parties, Congress and NCP, and said that he had urged Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray to stitch a “natural alliance”. The leader, however, said that there was no response from the chief minister, so Eknath Shinde, who was heading the faction, “took a stand”. “We have traditionally been rivals of the NCP and Congress, they are our primary challengers in constituencies. We should forge a natural alliance with CM Uddhav Thackeray,” rebel Shiv Sena MLA Chimanrao Patil said in a video tweeted by Eknath Shinde.
Patil claimed that the faction has the support of two-thirds of the Shiv Sena MLAs as well as 10 independents. The Uddhav Thackeray faction had recently filed a petition before the Deputy Speaker of the Maharashtra Assembly for the disqualification of 12 rebel MLAs. As the rebels are camping in Guwahati, some of their offices in Maharashtra were allegedly ransacked by Shiv Sena workers. Following this, Shinde on Saturday wrote to Uddhav Thackeray for allegedly “maliciously” withdrawing the security of the family members of 38 MLAs who were camping with him at a hotel in Guwahati.