The Election Commission on Monday disallowed any symbols with religious overtones in its order the Shiv Sena dispute.
The polling body said the Uddhav Thackeray-led faction can use flaming torch (‘mashaal’) in the interim, while the Eknath Shinde-group faction was asked to submit three options by 10am on Tuesday.
The Uddhav faction will be recognised as the Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray), while Shinde’s group name would be ‘Balasahebanchi Shiv Sena’.
Soon after, the Thackeray-led group said it considered the EC ruling as a major victory. “We are happy, consider this a major victory,” said Bhaskar Jadhav, a Thackeray loyalist.
The EC’s order came after both the camps submitted their options for poll symbols with the commission.
While the Thackeray-led faction had urged the polling body to finalise one of three symbols – a ‘trident’, ‘burning torch’, and ‘rising Sun’, the camp-headed by Shinde submitted ‘rising Sun’, ‘trident’ and ‘mace’ to the EC.
In its order, the EC had last week barred both the factions from using the party name and its election symbol in the upcAndheri East assembly bypoll.
Aided by the BJP, Shinde had engineered a rebellion in the Sena, leading to the fall of Thackeray’s coalition government in June-end. A day later, Shinde was named chief minister of Maharashtra with BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis as his deputy.
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