Battle for the Bow and Arrow

The Shiv Sena dispute before the Supreme Court is no longer just about MLAs and symbols, but about what legally defines a political party. AI generated image The fight over the Shiv Sena has moved well beyond Maharashtra’s familiar political theatre. In the Supreme Court, the dispute has narrowed to a question that is less dramatic on the surface but potentially far more consequential: what exactly makes a political party a political party? Is it the elected strength of its legislators? The...

min read

The Shiv Sena dispute before the Supreme Court is no longer just about MLAs and symbols, but about what legally defines a political party. AI generated image The fight over the Shiv Sena has moved well beyond Maharashtra’s familiar political theatre. In the Supreme Court, the dispute has narrowed to a question that is less dramatic on the surface but potentially far more consequential: what exactly makes a political party a political party? Is it the elected strength of its legislators? The organisation outside the legislature? The party constitution on record with the Election Commission? Or some combination of all three? That question lies at the centre of the legal battle between the factions led by Eknath Shinde and Uddhav Thackeray. Two Claims Senior advocate Neeraj Kishan Kaul, appearing for the Shinde faction, has defended the Election Commission’s February 17, 2023 decision, recognising the Shinde camp as the Shiv Sena and allotting it the bow-and-arrow symbol. The Thackeray faction has challenged that decision. The bench is also dealing with challenges connected to the Maharashtra Assembly Speaker’s January 2024 decision on disqualification petitions. The Thackeray faction, represented by senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Devadatt Kamat, has drawn a sharp distinction between the political party and its legislature wing. Its argument is a group of MLAs breaking away from the legislative wing does not automatically mean that the political party itself has changed hands. The party’s organisation, structure and identity cannot simply be equated with the numbers sitting in the Assembly. The Shinde faction says the dispute was never merely about legislators walking out. According to its argument, the rupture extended into the wider political organisation, with competing meetings, resolutions and claims of support from party workers and functionaries. The legislative split was, in its telling, only one visible part of a larger party-wide conflict. That distinction determines whether the Election Commission could legitimately intervene under Paragraph 15 of the Election Symbols Order and decide which rival faction represented the recognised political party. Kaul has argued that the Commission was entitled to consider the wider organisational dispute rather than treating the matter as a purely legislative rebellion. Constitutional Tussle The courtroom fight has also brought an old Shiv Sena document back into the spotlight. Kaul has relied heavily on the constitution placed on record with the Election Commission after the poll panel raised objections to the party’s earlier structure. The material before the court says the Commission had, in the late 1990s, pushed for a more democratic organisational structure, including changes to the manner in which party office-bearers were selected. The 1999 constitution subsequently went on record. The Shinde side says the 2018 constitution represented a significant departure from that structure. Its argument is that the later arrangement concentrated substantial authority in the party chief and relied extensively on nominated or appointed office-bearers rather than elected organisational bodies. It has also questioned why its leaders participated in the organisational structure created under the 2018 arrangement and did not object to it at the time. Kaul has further argued that the 2018 constitution relied upon by the Thackeray faction was not registered with the Election Commission, while the 1999 constitution was on the Commission’s record. This has become a significant element of the Shinde faction’s case. The Thackeray faction, meanwhile, has relied on the Supreme Court’s earlier Constitution Bench judgment in the Subhash Desai matter to reinforce the distinction between a political party and its legislature party. The earlier judgment’s discussion about not conflating the political party with its legislature wing arose in the context of questions such as who could appoint the whip. It did not, according to the Shinde side, mean that the Election Commission must ignore legislative strength altogether when determining which faction represents a recognised political party. The Shinde side has also invoked the Sadiq Ali case, arguing that legislative majority remains a relevant consideration in a party-symbol dispute. The case has therefore increasingly begun to look like a legal examination of the Election Commission’s decision-making process. The Thackeray faction has questioned the Commission’s jurisdiction and the basis on which it concluded that there was a party-wide split. Its challenge effectively asks whether the Commission went too far in examining the internal structure of the Shiv Sena. The Shinde faction argues that Article 324 gives the Election Commission broad powers and that, when two groups claim the same recognised party, the Commission has to examine the party constitution, organisational structure and available evidence to identify which group represents the party. The practical difficulty is obvious. The Election Commission cannot ask every Shiv Sena member whom they support. Nor can it conduct a referendum among every booth-level worker. Kaul has therefore defended the organisational-majority approach as a workable method of assessing cadre support through recognised organisational bodies and elected representatives. The Shinde camp has also brought the events after the 2019 Maharashtra Assembly election into the argument. Shiv Sena and BJP fought the election together, but the government subsequently formed under Uddhav Thackeray was with Congress and NCP. According to the Shinde side, that political realignment created discontent among sections of the Shiv Sena organisation and contributed to the eventual split. The Thackeray faction disputes the broader narrative and maintains that the legislative rebellion cannot simply be converted into proof that the political party itself changed hands. It has also challenged the Maharashtra Speaker’s decision not to disqualify MLAs from either faction. The Supreme Court has examined questions about what could follow if that decision were set aside, including whether consequential disqualification could arise under the Tenth Schedule. Party recognition and legislative disqualification arise under different legal frameworks. The Shinde side has argued that earlier cases concerning disqualification cannot simply be transplanted into the Election Commission’s determination under the Symbols Order. The real question is no longer simply who has more MLAs. It is whether those MLAs, the party organisation, the constitution and the cadre can legally be treated as parts of the same answer. (The writer is a political observer. Views personal.)

The Cost of Constant Consumption

Prithvi Asthana

Mar 25

3 min read

As we curate our content, the deeper question is whether content is quietly curating us.

Few can manage a 90-hour workweek, but most would easily go beyond a 90-hour social media week. With our growing appetite for social media and instant commerce, the real question is no longer just how we consume, but how much. In an age where every swipe, click and scroll is engineered to hold attention, overconsumption is becoming less a habit and more a way of life. What once felt private is now constantly translated into data, tracked, analysed and fed back to us as personalised content.

Our chat topics increasingly shape what appears on our feeds, drawing us deeper into social media and blurring the line between private thought and public consumption. Shopping apps track our preferences and know exactly what to show us, when to show it, and how to keep us engaged. As we curate our content, is content curating us too? In India, this influence is amplified by scale: the country has over 820 million internet users, more than half from rural India. And because creating content now requires little more than a smartphone, production has exploded, feeding an endless supply of content to consume. We are no longer just seeking information online; we are constantly being served information we never asked for.

The Attention Trap

Urban youth face intense pressure to keep pace with the latest memes and trends, consuming more content in pursuit of social validation. For many, especially the young, staying updated has become a form of cultural currency — a way to belong, be seen and stay relevant. Across the world, users spend an average of more than two hours a day on social media, while reels lasting just 30 to 90 seconds are steadily reshaping attention spans. What begins as constant engagement online does not stay there. With everything at our fingertips, people are becoming less tolerant of delay, boredom and inconvenience. The speed of the internet is not just shrinking our attention spans — it is eroding our patience in everyday life.

Convenience Culture

Quick commerce platforms have turned this impatience into a business model. Ten-minute deliveries, constant offers and endless discounts encourage impulsive buying, from groceries to stationery, while quietly raising our expectations for speed. Convenience now drives not just what we buy but how we behave — leaving users less tolerant of delays and delivery workers under relentless pressure.

A 2018 Pew Research Centre survey of 743 teens found that 31% lost focus in class while checking their phones. Increased internet use also disrupts sleep, as young adults scroll through reels late into the night, leaving many sleep-deprived. The endless scroll is designed to make stopping difficult, and reduced sleep worsens mood, irritability and concentration.

Late Gen Z and Gen Alpha differ sharply from earlier generations. Raised on algorithms and personalised feeds, their worldview is shifting, while teachers increasingly struggle with shrinking attention spans and worsening classroom behaviour. Rising loneliness and excessive screen time have also blurred the line between online and offline life. As screen time rises, the warmth of community and unstructured human interaction is giving way to more mediated and transactional forms of connection.

Algorithms & Intimacy

Artificial intelligence has rapidly integrated into our routines, making tasks easier and more convenient. Large language models are trained on human interactions, and the more we use them, the more they adapt to our habits, perceptions and preferences — deepening their influence on our lives. As with social media, what feels intuitive or personalised is often the result of systems learning us faster than we realise. The more seamless these systems become, the easier it is to mistake convenience for connection and prediction for understanding.

In the 21st century, data has become central to our existence. Social media and AI exploit our psychology, trapping attention in a cycle of constant content exchange. Sharing even small details updates our feeds almost instantly, sometimes making algorithms seem to understand us better than the people around us.

Users remain deeply engaged in this digital world, often believing their content is curated just for them. In reality, companies profit from these interactions, growing richer while shaping consumer behaviour. What feels personal is, at scale, a business model designed to monetise attention.

As digitisation rewires our brains and lifestyles, living offline has become increasingly difficult. New technologies promise convenience, but they are also reshaping how we consume content and experience the world. As we consume technology, the unsettling truth is that we may also be consuming ourselves.

Battle for the Bow and Arrow

The Cost of Constant Consumption

Recent Posts

Comments