Shiv Sena party office at Vidhan Bhavan belongs to us: Shinde faction leader

The chief whip of Shiv Sena Shinde faction Bharat Gogawale with other MLAs reached Vidhan Bhavan on Monday and gave notice to the Speaker of the Maharashtra Assembly Rahul Narvekar asking for the handover of the Shiv Sena legislative party office at Vidhan BhavanBharat Gogawale said that the office at Vidhan Bhavan belonged to the Shinde faction after the ECI orderWe have given a notice to the Speaker We are following the orders of ECI We will take a call on how to proceed further Since ECI has recognised us as Shiv Sena so this office belongs to us now he saidElection Commission of India ECI on February 17 allotted the party name Shiv Sena and the symbol Bow and Arrow to the faction led by Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath ShindeNotably both factions of Shiv Sena Eknath Shinde and Uddhav Thackeray have been fighting for the bow and arrow symbol of the party since Shinde present Maharashtra Chief Minister revolted against Thackeray last yearWhile the Shinde faction welcomed the decision of being recognized as the real Shiv Sena the Uddhav Thackeray faction said they would move the Supreme CourtAlso ReadStay within limits Ashish Shelar hits back at Sanjay Raut amid Sena symbol rowThe Uddhav Thackeray faction accused the Election Commission of haste and said the decision shows it works as BJP agentThe Commission observed in its order that the current constitution of the Shiv Sena party is undemocratic and has been mutilated to undemocratically appoint people from a coterie as office bearers without any election at all It said such party structures fail to inspire confidenceCalling the poll panels decision as murder of democracy Uddhav Thackeray said he will approach the Supreme Court against the decisionLast month both the Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and former CM Uddhav Thackerayled factions of the Shiv Sena submitted their written statements in support of their claims of control over the party name and symbol to the Election CommissionThe ECI had frozen the bow and arrow symbol of the Shiv Sena and had allotted the Two Swords and Shield symbol to the Eknath Shinde faction of Shiv Sena and the flaming torch mashaal election symbol was allotted to the Uddhav Thackeray faction for the bypoll in Andheri East assembly constituency in November last yearHowever exuding confidence in winning the election with the torch symbol former Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Saturday challenged Maharashtra CM Eknath Shinde to contest the election with the stolen bow and arrow stating that the battle has begunHe further said that the thieves were given the holy bow and arrow and that this is their testThieves were given the holy bow and arrow similarly the torch mashaal can be taken away I challenge them if they are men come in front of us even with the stolen bow and arrow we will contest the election with the torch This is our test the battle has begun Thackeray saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever