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By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

Shinde ‘feasts’ on Thackeray’s party

AI generated image Mumbai: The Shiv Sena (UBT)’s worst fears proved true on Thursday when six suspected ‘turncoat’ MPs failed to attend its crucial parliamentary party meeting in New Delhi – signaling another ‘split’ in four years – and posing a serious challenge to ex-Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray’s leadership and credibility. The crucial parliamentary party meeting saw only three (out of total 9) Lok Sabha MPs – Arvind Sawant (Mumbai South), Anil Desai (Mumbai South-Central) and...

Shinde ‘feasts’ on Thackeray’s party

AI generated image Mumbai: The Shiv Sena (UBT)’s worst fears proved true on Thursday when six suspected ‘turncoat’ MPs failed to attend its crucial parliamentary party meeting in New Delhi – signaling another ‘split’ in four years – and posing a serious challenge to ex-Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray’s leadership and credibility. The crucial parliamentary party meeting saw only three (out of total 9) Lok Sabha MPs – Arvind Sawant (Mumbai South), Anil Desai (Mumbai South-Central) and Rajabhau Waje (Nashik) – in attendance as per a whip issued two days ago, when the so-called ‘Operation Tiger’ was in advanced stages. At the tense meeting, with their eyes trained on the doors, they waited for over an hour for their six LS colleagues - Sanjay Dina Patil (Mumbai North East), Nagesh Patil Ashtikar (Hingoli), Sanjay Jadhav (Parbhani), Omprakash Nimbalkar (Dharashiv), Sanjay Deshmukh (Yavatmal-Washim) and Bhausaheb Wakchaure (Shirdi) – who never turned up. Emerging from the meeting the ruffled trio of Raut, Sawant and Desai confronted the huge crowd of media-persons and announced what was already public knowledge – that the SS (UBT) was breaking again. A tense Sawant somehow managed to smile and said that since the 6 MPs have defied the party whip, they would face the appropriate consequences. “We have followed the procedures and sent them individual show-cause notices, seeking their replies within a week,” he said. Raut said that if they fail to reply to the show-cause notices, then the party will initiate the necessary proceedings – in the Parliament, the courts and the streets. Operation Tudva In a raging mood, Raut warned that the SS (UBT) workers will ‘teach’ all the six MPs a lesson and now the party had launched a counter ‘Operation Tudva’ – akin to a similar initiative implemented successfully by the (undivided) NCP in 2019. “They are unscrupulous, unprincipled traitors. We have been told that they have taken huge sums of money to break away from our party. They took Rs 15-cr. to board the chartered aircraft two days ago, and yesterday again took Rs 10-cr to go to an undisclosed destination in Rajasthan,” claimed Raut, his outburst splattered with expletives for the second day. He reiterated his demand that “if all the six MPs first resign from their seats and contest elections afresh, we shall not label them as traitors”, even as Nationalist Congress Party (SP) MLA Rohit Pawar alleged that each MP reportedly stood to make Rs 85-cr, plus more through other means. Threatening MPs Angry Shiv Sainiks burnt effigies of all the MPs in their respective constituencies and threatened of physical attacks or their properties, prompting the state government to accord them Y-Plus category security as per a wireless directives issued by the State Commissioner of Intelligence Shirish Jain today. Indicating deep fissures, the absence of the six MPs pointed to the likelihood of them officially preparing to align with the Shiv Sena led by Deputy CM Eknath Shinde marking success of the ‘Operation Tiger’. Yesterday, the rebels had called on Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and submitted a letter seeking to be recognized as a separate parliamentary group. The SS (UBT) also met the Speaker yesterday to submit a counter-letter and urged him to refrain from according any recognition to the breakaway group, and stick to the laws and Constitutional norms. However, if the Speaker accepts the rebels’ plea, it could formalize the impending ‘split’ and prove a huge setback for the SS (UBT). Eknath Shinde gets the “lion’s share” of SS (UBT) Prowling stealthily and effectively Shiv Sena President and Deputy CM Eknath Shinde ostensibly masterminded the ‘Operation Tiger’ and took away the lion’s share of 6 (out of 9) MPs from his bete-noire, ex-CM Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) – for the second time in 4 years with lot of symbolism attached to the political man-hunt. Though party sources remained tight-lipped, it is learnt that Shinde’s ace team of political and legal advisors have gone through all the nitty-gritties, all the possibilities, the fallout in Parliament, the courts and the streets, before giving the green signal to strike at Thackeray’s party. On the next course, a party leader said that “only Shinde-ji has the authority” to decide and speak on this”, and he may well have some new aces up his trademark white-shirt sleeves in the coming days.

"PM Modi can run away from special session, but not from monsoon session": Jairam Ramesh



New Delhi: Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Jairam Ramesh on Wednesday took a jibe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said that he can "run away" from a special session of Parliament being demanded by the opposition parties, but not from the monsoon session, which will be convened on July 21.



Expressing reservations over the central government not convening a special session to discuss many issues, including the deadly Pahalgam terror attack and developments following Operation Sindoor, Ramesh accused the government of "diverting attention".



"We've been demanding a special session of Parliament. Yesterday, 16 political parties also wrote. In order to divert attention from the special session, the government suddenly announces the monsoon session of Parliament. The Prime Minister can run away from a special session, but he cannot run away from the Monsoon session," Ramesh told ANI.



He said that the INDIA bloc parties are demanding a special session to be convened immediately since the issues that need to be discussed are "agitating" people in the country now. Ramesh raised concerns about the sudden halt on Operation Sindoor and the revelations made by Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Anil Chauhan in Singapore about India's losses and gains during the recently concluded conflict.



"We are demanding a discussion on these issues now because these are the issues agitating the people of India now. Why was Operation Sindoor stopped after four days? What has the CDS said in Singapore? Why has Trump, in the last 20 days, repeated 12 times that it is because of him that a ceasefire happened between India and Pakistan? These are the issues the Prime Minister doesn't want to answer," the Congress leader said.



He further argued that this was the first time in the parliamentary history of India that a session had been announced 47 days in advance, and this came despite the continuous demands made by the opposition parties to convene a special session.



"The parliament session is always announced a few days in advance...maybe a maximum of one week or 10 days in advance. Never before in India's parliamentary history has a session been announced 47 days in advance. The object(ive) is very simple. There is a continuing demand from Congress and INDIA parties for a special session of Parliament to discuss the Pahalgam terror attack," Ramesh said.



He highlighted the concerns regarding the "hyphenation" of India and Pakistan and the repeated claims made by US President Donald Trump that he was responsible for a "ceasefire" between the two neighbouring countries.



"The fact that terrorists themselves haven't been brought to justice, the repeated claims of (US) President Trump...the Narendra ka Surrender to Trump. The hyphenation of India and Pakistan, the growing nexus between China and Pakistan, the failure of our diplomacy and foreign policy and the revelation of the Chief of Defence Staff that has been in Singapore and not in our country. These are the real issues," Ramesh said.



Earlier in the day, Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju announced that the Monsoon session of the Parliament will commence from July 21 and run till August 12. Both Houses of the Parliament are scheduled to convene on July 21 at 11 am, after a break of over three months.



The upcoming Monsoon session will be the first Parliament session following Operation Sindoor, which India launched on May 7 in response to a terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam that claimed 26 lives.

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