The Shiv Sena's leader, Bal Thackeray has always been known to command the absolute loyalty of his partymen.
The Shiv Sena's leader, Bal Thackeray has always been known to command the absolute loyalty of his partymen. Thackeray's word is law and his diktats final; rebels are not tolerated and should anyone try and raise inconvenient questions, he finds himself out of the organisation.
The last such renegade was Chaggan Bhujbal, who joined the Nationalist Congress Party but could not take any Sainiks along with him. Other leaders have preferred discretion and opted to stay within the fold.
No longer. Leaders as well as ordinary sainiks are leaving the party in droves. Earlier this year Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Nirupam quit and joined the Congress to be followed last month by former chief minister Narayan Rane.
Of the two, the departure of Rane is bound to have a greater impact. Rane was no ordinary Sainik. He joined it as a young lad of 16 and rose from the ranks to occupy the highest elected post in the state. Then he hit a glass ceiling with no prospect of moving up the party structure because Bal Thackeray's son Uddhav is widely considered as the heir apparent.
Rane had no option but to leave the Sena and the Congress happily took him. He has his own mass base and more importantly has the potential to damage the Shiv Sena in the critical Konkan region. The results of his departure are plainly visible to see. Sena workers and middle-level leaders are defecting en masse not only in Konkan but also in Mumbai, which has always been the party's bastion.
Deserting party workers say they have been exasperated at the 'high-handedness' of Uddhav Thackeray and the short shrift given to not only Rane but others like the Sena supremo's nephew Raj, another contender for the top job in the future.
All of this should worry the Sena supremo. A well structured organisational base is one of the strengths of the Sena which has always stood it in good stead in elections, especially at the local level.
With municipal elections in the city a year away, an exodus from the rank and file has the potential to terminally weaken the party. Bal Thackeray will need to so some serious thinking if he wants the party he created to outlast him.
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