With the political temperature soaring in the state, Maharashtra assembly speaker Rahul Narwekar is all set to announce his decision on the disqualification rebel Sena MLAs including CM Eknath Shinde. While the decision will be announced around 4 pm today, Chief Minister Shinde has maintained that his Sena is the original Sena. 

“I just want to say that we have a majority. 67% in Vidhan Sabha and 75% in Lok Sabha. We have 13 MPS and 50 MLAs. Based on this majority, the Election Commission has recognised us as the original Shiv Sena and allotted the bow-arrow symbol. We hope that the speaker will pass us on merit,” said Shinde. With this statement, CM Shinde indicated that he is not worried about the verdict at all.

Meanwhile, the Shiv Sena (UBT) has slammed the speaker and the CM alleging a match-fixing over the duo’s January 7 meeting. While the assembly speaker will decide on the cross-petitions by both Shiv Sena factions seeking disqualification of each other’s MLAs following a split in the party, the decision will decide the way forward for the Eknath Shinde government. 

Narwekar’s decision will come more than 18 months after the Shiv Sena suffered a split which led to the fall of the Thackeray government. Uddhav Thackeray yesterday said his party has filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court objecting to a recent meeting between Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, who is among the MLAs whose disqualification has been sought.

“If the judge (Narwekar) is going to meet the accused, what should we expect from that judge,” Thackeray asked. The affidavit before the SC was filed on Monday, the former CM said.

Hitting back, Narwekar said Thackeray should know for what purposes a speaker could meet a chief minister. “If he still levels such allegations, then his motive is very clear. There is no rule that a speaker while hearing disqualification pleas, cannot do any other work,” Narwekar contended.

The Supreme Court had last month extended the deadline to January 10 from December 31 for Narwekar to decide on the cross-petitions.

After the June 2022 split, the Election Commission had given the ‘Shiv Sena’ name and ‘bow and arrow’ symbol to the Shinde-led faction, while the one headed by Thackeray was called the Shiv Sena (UBT) with a flaming torch as its symbol. In July last year, the Ajit Pawar faction of the NCP also joined the Shinde-led government. Assembly polls in Maharashtra are due around October this year. (With agency inputs)