Rahul Shewale urges Thackeray to back NDA’s Prez candidate
In a development that has triggered fears in the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena camp about a fresh rebellion within the parent party,  party MP Rahul Shewale has written to the Sena chief urging him to support the candidature of BJP-led NDA’s Presidential nominee Draupadi Murmu.

Currently, the Shiv Sena has 18 Lok Sabha members. Of them, four MPs have already shifted loyalty from the parent Shiv Sena to the Eknath Shinde camp. They comprise Shrikant Shinde, son of current Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, Bhavana Gawali, Rajan Vichare. At least half a dozen MPs have either agreed to shift to the side or are in touch with Eknath Shinde.

As the parent Sena grappled with the recent unprecedented Eknath Shinde-staged rebellion that led to the party losing power in Maharashtra, Shewale posed a fresh headache to party chief Uddhav Thackeray by urging him to extend support to Draupadi Murmu,  a tribal woman member of the BJP and former Governor of Jharkhand.

Murmu is taking on the joint Opposition candidate  Yashwant Sinha.

Given that Shewale is a loyal party man, his formal request to the party president — made through a letter submitted on Tuesday — has come as a big shock at a time when the Sena leadership has not taken kindly to the manner in which the BJP helped Sena’s rebel leader Eknath Shinde engineer a split in the parent party and formed an alliance government in the State, dislodging the MVA Government.

Behind Shewale’s move there appears to be more than  what meets the eye, considering that the Sersa MP’s request to his party chief coincided with an appeal by the Eknath Shinde camp spokesman Deepak Kesarkar to all legislators and MPs from across parties in Maharashtra to support Murmu in keeping with Maharashtra’s tradition of recognising the women’s contribution to the society.

In his letter to the Sena president, Shewale said that Draupadi Murmu hailed from the tribal community and she had made a huge contribution to public life. Before coming to politics, Murmu was a teacher and later served as an honorary assistant professor in the Shri Aurobindo Integral Education and Research, Rairangpur. Thereafter, she worked as a junior assistant in the irrigation department of the Odisha Government. Draupadi Murmu also served in an important position of the Governor of Jharkhand.

Shewale reminded Uddhav that late Sena chief Balasaheb Thackeray had not backed the NDA candidate when there was a Shiv Sena-BJP alliance.  “Balasaheb had supported Pratibha Patil as he hails from Maharashtra. Similarly, the Shiv Sena chief had also backed Pranab Mukherjee. I humbly request that you support Murmu and direct all Shiv Sena MPs to do so, keeping in mind her background and contribution to public life,” Shewale wrote in his letter.

Currently, the Shiv Sena has 18 Lok Sabha members. Of them, four MPs have already shifted loyalty from the parent Shiv Sena to the Eknath Shinde camp. They comprise: Shriknat Shinde, son of current Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, Bhavana Gawali, Rajan Vichare. At least half a dozen MPs have either agreed to shift to sides or are in touch with Eknath Shinde.

Notwithstanding fears of a possibility of a fresh rebellion within the party, the Shiv Sena will in all likelihood support Yeshwant Sinha’s candidature in the polls — especially in the light of the fact that both the NCP and Congress have stood solidly by the Shiv Sena during the recent developments that saw rebel part leader Eknath Shinde walk away with the party’s 40 out of the 55 MLAs reducing the Sena to a party with just 15 MLAs.

Informed Sena sources said that the party leadership had reached out to Shewale and other party MPs in the state in its bid to ensure against a possible fresh rebellion - this time among the party MPs. It remains to be seen if the Uddhav Thackeray-led Sena is able to hold its flock of MPs together in the face of poaching efforts by the Eknath Shinde camp.