Supreme Court to hear Uddhav Thackeray's plea against EC decision on Sena symbol on Feb 22

On February 20, the Uddhav Thackeray faction approached the Supreme Court (SC) to challenge the order of the Election Commission (EC) that allocates the "bow and arrow" poll symbol to the Eknath Shinde faction.

The Supreme Court has agreed to hear on February 22 the Uddhav Thackeray faction's plea challenging the decision of the Election Commission (EC) recognising Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde-led faction as the real Shiv Sena and ordering allocation of the "bow and arrow" poll symbol to it.

Appearing for the Thackeray faction, senior advocate Kapil Sibal mentioned the matter before a bench of Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and Justices Krishna Murari and PS Narasimha on February 21.

"If the EC order is not stayed then they will take over the symbol and the bank accounts. Please list it tomorrow before the Constitution bench," Sibal said. The faction had moved the court on February 20 against the EC order.

Also Read | EC recognises Eknath Shinde faction as real Shiv Sena

The court said it needed to go through the case files and posted the matter for hearing at 3.30 pm on February 22.

The Election Commission on February 18 recognised the Eknath Shinde-led faction as the real Shiv Sena and ordered the allocation of the "bow and arrow" poll symbol to it.

In a 78-page order on the protracted battle for control of the organisation, the Commission allowed the Thackeray faction to keep the "flaming torch" poll symbol allocated to it till the completion of the assembly by-polls in the state.

The Commission said MLAs backing Shinde got nearly 76 percent of the votes polled in favour of the 55 winning Shiv Sena candidates in the 2019 Maharashtra assembly polls.

The Thackeray faction's MLAs got 23.5 percent of the votes polled in favour of the winning Shiv Sena candidates, the three-member Commission said.

In June 2022, a majority of Shiv Sena MLAs shifted their loyalty to Eknath Shinde plunging the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) into a crisis and leading to the resignation of then Chief Minister Uddhav Thackerey.

From then the dispute of the 'real' Shiv Sena prevails as the political party was split into two parts - Uddhav Thackerey's faction and Eknath Shinde's faction.