New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Shiv Sena ties, after a series of empty threats, could be heading towards some fireworks ahead of Diwali.
Sena MP Sanjay Raut on Monday hinted that time was nigh for calling it quits with the BJP in Maharashtra.
According to Raut, who is also the executive editor of Saamana - the Shiv Sena mouthpiece - the party didn't want to "share the blame" for BJP’s anti-people policies such as an exorbitant rise in petrol and diesel prices despite a global meltdown of fuel prices.
But Sena’s anger against the BJP goes beyond concerns for the consumer. Uddhav Thackeray’s party has lost out in most of the battles against its senior partner, especially after Narendra Modi became the face ahead of the 2014 Lok Sabha election.
Most of the party’s candidates forfeited their deposits in in elections they fought since the 2014 parliamentary polls.
Starting from Jharkhand election (2014) in which Sena candidates forfeited their deposits in all three seats, it had chosen to fight alone in Maharashtra, where the party is still considered a force to reckon with. In Maharashtra state polls, 129 out of 288 of its candidates forfeited their deposits.
Similarly, in the 2015 Bihar polls, the party nominated candidates in 73 constituencies and all of them forfeited their deposits. In Delhi, the same year, all 19 party candidates met a similar fate.
Last year, Sena’s electoral fortunes continued to plumb new depths. For instance, in Assam, all three candidates faced a humiliating defeat. The script didn’t change in Kerala either. All 16 of its candidates failed to make their party proud.
In neighbouring Tamil Nadu, known for bipolar contests like in Kerala, Sena fielded 36 candidates, and all of them cut a sorry figure. The same fate befell on 21 of its candidates in West Bengal elections.
The Sena failed to buck the trend this year, too. For instance, in Goa elections, three of its candidates forfeited their deposits. In Punjab, another 15 of its contestants got blown away in the face of a stiff triangular contest between the Aam Aadmi Party, the BJP-SAD and the eventual winner, Congress.
In Uttar Pradesh, where the party had fielded 57 candidates, most of them suffered severe electoral reverses. In Uttarakhand, all nine Sena contestants forfeited their deposits.
According to the Election Commission of India (ECI), if a candidate fails to get a minimum of one-sixth of the total valid votes polled, the deposit goes to the treasury.
Every candidate is required to make security deposits at the time of filing her/his nomination. The security deposits for Lok Sabha election is Rs 25,000, while for an assembly poll it is Rs 10,000.
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