In what comes as a big victory for the Eknath Shinde faction of Shiv Sena, the Election Commission on Friday recognised it as the real Shiv Sena and ordered the allocation of the 'bow and arrow' poll symbol to it.
After the rebellion led by Shinde which led to the fall of the Uddhav Thackeray government, both factions have been staking claim to the name and original symbol of the party.
Justifying its move in a 78-page order, the commission observed that MLAs backing Eknath Shinde got nearly 76 per cent of votes polled in favour of the 55 winning Shiv Sena candidates in the 2019 Maharashtra assembly polls.
The commission allowed the Uddhav Thackeray faction to keep the "flaming torch" poll symbol allocated to it till the completion of the assembly bypolls in the state.
The commission said the respondent (Thackeray faction) had relied heavily on the 2018 Constitution of the party to stake claim to the poll symbol and the organisation but the party had not informed the Commission about the amendment to the Constitution.
"The amended Constitution of 2018 is not on record of the commission," the order said, and added that it found that the party Constitution, on which the Thackeray faction was placing strong reliance, to be "undemocratic".
"To put it in a nutshell, the party Constitution envisages the president nominating the Electoral College that is to elect him. This goes against the spirit of democracy and negates the very purpose for which the entire exercise was carried out," the Commission said.
"I thank Election Commission. Majority counts in democracy," Shinde said, reacting to the poll panel's decision, and claimed that this is the victory of Balasaheb's legacy. Ours is the true Shiv Sena, he said. "We set up the government in Maharashtra (with BJP) last year keeping in mind thoughts of Balasaheb," Shinde added.
"This country runs on the Constitution drafted by Babasaheb Ambedkar. We formed our government on the basis of that Constitution. The EC order that came today is on the basis of merit. I express my gratitude to the Election Commission," news agency ANI quoted Shinde as saying.
The Shiv Sena that walks on ideologies of Balasaheb Thackeray—CM Shinde's Shiv Sena—has become the original Shiv Sena, said Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. "My greetings to him. We were confident from day one because if you look at EC's earlier orders on different parties, they were similar decisions," he added.
Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut called the movie the "murder of democracy." His party will "go to the people," he said and claimed that the panel's decision was on the expected lines.
After the announcement, Shinde updated his profile picture on Twitter and posted Shiv Sena's 'bow and arrow' symbol as the profile picture.
—With PTI inputs