Aaditya Thackeray, son of Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray was elected as the legislature party leader at a meeting of the newly elected party MLAs in Mumbai on Monday.
Aaditya defeated Milind Deora of the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena in the recent assembly elections from Worli.
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Former minister Bhaskar Jadhav was elected the party group leader in the state assembly, while Sunil Prabhu was named the party's chief whip.
In the prestige assembly elections, the first since the Shiv Sena suffered a vertical split, the Uddhav Thackeray faction won only 20 out of the 95 seats it contested. The rival faction led by outgoing Chief Minister Eknath Shinde won 57 of the 81 seats it contested.
Shinde’s Sena is a constituent of the ruling Mahayuti while Thackeray’s faction is an ally of the opposition Congress and the NCP (SP).
Aaditya has served has the minister higher education, tourism and environment in the previous Maha Vikas Aghadi government. In 2020 he was made the guardian minister of Mumbai Suburban district.
He made his electoral debut in 2019 when he contested and won from the Worli seat, thus became the first member from the Thackeray family to contest and win elections.
In 2014 elections, however, his winning margin considerably reduced to 8,801 votes from 67,427 votes in the 2019 elections.
