West Bengal polls: Shiv Sena's 'tiger' to take on the 'Royal Bengal Tigress'

Hoping to extend its territory beyond Maharashtra the ruling Shiv Sena has announced it will sound the poll bugle soon in the upcoming West Bengal Assembly elections due in another threefour monthsThe proclamation by partys Chief Spokesperson and MP Sanjay Rauts was on expected lines and it will be their third foray into the West Bengal polls after 2016 Assembly and 2019 General where it notched a nil in terms of seatsPreviously the Sena has contested different elections in Delhi Uttar Pradesh Bihar Gujarat and Jammu and Kashmir in its ambition to command influence nationallyLate on Sunday Raut said After discussions with party chief Uddhav Thackeray Shiv Sena has decided to contest the WB assembly elections We are reaching Kolkata soon and greeted Jai Hind and in Bengali Joi BanglaRauts timing is significant just a week before January 23 the 124th birth anniversary of Bengals great son Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and 95th birth anniversary of Shiv Sena founder and Hindu HridaySamrat the late Balasaheb ThackerayHowever it is not clear yet whether the Sena will hitch onto one of the major political alignments being cobbled in West Bengal or prefer ekla cholo re go soloCurrent indications suggest it may attempt to spite its former ally Bharatiya Janata Party BJP by gnawing away at its crucial Hindutva votebanksSena sources claim that the BJP has been making attempts to destabilize and dethrone constitutionallyelected governments in all oppositionruled states including Maharashtra and West Bengal which goes contrary to the principles of the federal structureIn November 2019 Thackeray took over as Maharashtra Chief Minister of the Maha Vikas Aghadi MVA comprising Shiv Sena Nationalist Congress Party and Congress a development from which the stunned BJP has yet to recoverThe BJP has launched a mission to unseat the ruling Trinamool Congresss Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee who is virtually cornered akin to a Royal Bengal Tigress ahead of the poll battleBanerjee is expected to fight toothandnail on various fronts the BJP on one hand and the Left FrontCongress combine on the other punctuated by suspicious partypoopers like Asaduddin Owaisis All India MajliseIttehadul Muslimeen AIMIM and local forces on the West Bengal pollscapeIncidentally ruling ally Nationalist Congress Party NCP President Sharad Pawar has already said he would visit Kolkata soon to extend support to Banerjees TMC as part of plans to build up a grand alliance of national and state opposition parties before the 2024 Lok Sabha electionsCongress sources also do not rule out the possibility of a repeat of Maharashtras MVA experiment in West Bengal if the state throws up a fractured mandate in the pollsThe unthinkable happened in Maharashtra and it is working smoothly Anything is possible even in WB MVA is a national example to make states strong said a senior state leader guardedly on the odds with three archrivals in West Bengal Congress Left Front and Trinamool hugging each other to keep the BJP at bayNot leaving any stone unturned the BJP is in hyperaggressive mode to capture and tame West Bengal which has been a Communist fortress for nearly three decades before Banerjee conquered it 10 years agoAlthough Banerjee and Thackeray are understood to enjoy cordial relations Pawars entry into the pollring could change the permutationscombinations there given his close rapport with top leaders across the political spectrumThackerayBanerjee met grinned and probably jelled in Mumbai in November 2017 when the latter was here to invite top industrialists to join the West Bengal Global Investment Summit2018 held in KolkataWhile Sena remains tightlipped for now on the number of seats it plans to contest it is likely to throw the hat in the ring in around 60odd constituencies in the 294member West Bengal Assembly pollsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever