Eye on civic polls, Sena shoots Belgaum arrow at BJP

MUMBAI: Uddhav Thackeray has brought up the border dispute with neighbouring Karnataka once again in a bid to hurl a political challenge at the BJP ahead of the municipal polls in the state, said observers on Monday.
The Shiv Sena president said reiterated the right of the state on Belgaum and other villages on the other side of the border. He said the dispute should be resolved at the earliest given the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance had now gained power in the state as well as at the Centre.
“It is pointless to be part of the government if the Marathi-speaking population living in the border areas is not given justice,” he said.
Thackeray was addressing a function in the city, where he performed the ground-breaking ceremony of the BMC-proposed Samyukta Maharashtra theme park in central Mumbai.
The Shiv Sena game plan is to raise the political mercury on the border dispute, an emotive issue in the state, ahead of the municipal elections this year in several urban centres, including Navi Mumbai and Kalyan-Dombivli. The Shiv Sena also wants to consolidate the Marathi votes to take on the BJP in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) election in 2017. Matoshree cannot afford to lose the cash-rich BMC, said political analysts.
State BJP chief Raosaheb Danve has been saying that his party might go solo in the civic elections.
On Sunday, Shiv Sena minister Divakar Raote also harped on the inter-state border dispute at a function in Belgaum. Speaking at the concluding session of the Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Natya Parishad, Raote slammed the Karnataka Government for smothering the cultural and political aspirations of the Marathi manoos in the border villages.