Another page was added to India’s political history on Friday, capturing the event that will echo through the corridors of power and serve as a reminder that even a slight strategic misstep can unravel a hold on power built over decades.Having first lost the father-founded Shiv Sena, Uddhav Thackeray has now ceded his last power citadel, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), a civic fortress once ruled unhindered by Bal Thackeray. In Asia’s richest civic polls, the Thackeray “brand” of politics had one of its key equities missing. Hindutva.While Uddhav Thackeray never expressed hostility towards Hindutva, even after aligning with the Congress and Sharad Pawar’s NCP, he struggled to step into his father’s shoes in carrying the ideological banner, which Eknath Shinde wore on his sleeve after splitting the party in the 2023 rebellion.By contrast, Uddhav’s attempt to reset the party’s ideological compass by leaning heavily on Marathi manoos and regional pride, and to give it momentum by aligning with his estranged cousin Raj Thackeray, ultimately ended in a damp squib.Marathi asmita: ApuriThe Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) and Raj Thackeray’s Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) combine had framed the BMC polls as a battle to “save the Marathi manoos” and Mumbai, projecting the contest as both an assertion of regional pride and a referendum on the Thackeray legacy.The reunion of Uddhav Thackeray and Raj Thackeray after nearly two decades was billed as an acid test for the Thackeray brand.
Shiv Sena (UBT) Chief Uddhav Thackeray and Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray with other party members during a joint BMC Election Campaign Rally, in Mumbai. (ANI photo)
While sections of the Marathi electorate did rally behind the cousins, the consolidation fell short of what was required to retain control of the civic body.The ‘save Marathis’ narrative appeared to have a limited electoral pull. The combine managed to hold on to pockets of south and central Mumbai and parts of the western and eastern suburbs, including Dadar-Mahim, Worli, Dindoshi, Bhandup, Vikhroli and Bandra East.However, it failed to make inroads into BJP-dominated constituencies such as Colaba, Bandra West, Andheri West, Borivli, and Dahisar. Political observers noted that a significant section of the city’s upwardly mobile Maharashtrian voters, particularly in the western suburbs, gravitated towards the BJP.
BJP workers celebrating outside party office in Mumbai after the massive victory in the BMC polls.
The underperformance of Shiv Sena (UBT) was compounded by the MNS’s poor showing. The MNS ended up in single digits, dragging down the overall Thackeray tally and underlining the limits of the reunion’s electoral impact.In September, Uddhav Thackeray himself had described the BMC election as a decisive test. Sena (UBT) contested 163 seats, the MNS 53, while the BJP fielded candidates in 137 wards and Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena in 90.
BMC seat share of political parties
BJP-led Mahayuti crossed the halfway mark of 114 in the 227-member body, but not by much. BJP won 89 seats and Shinde’s Shiv Sena 29 to gain a narrow lead. In effect, the BJP will need Eknath Shinde’s backing for big decisions.The Uddhav-Raj Thackeray combine won 71 seats (Uddhav’s Sena winning 65 and Raj Thackeray’s MNS taking 6), retaining a large chunk of wards in the city’s Marathi heartland.Although Sena (UBT) did receive backing from Muslim voters, with two candidates from the community winning, the support was far weaker than in the 2024 Lok Sabha and assembly elections, largely because the Congress was no longer part of the alliance.
BJP tops strike rate
Thackeray’s pivot to HindutvaWhen Bal Thackeray founded the Shiv Sena in 1966, the party was not conceived as a Hindutva platform. Its political grammar was rooted firmly in Marathi identity and regional assertion. The Sena positioned itself as the voice of the Marathi manoos in an increasingly cosmopolitan Bombay, railing against perceived economic and cultural marginalisation.
Shiv Sena Chief Balasaheb Thackeray addressing a Dussera meeting at Shivaji Park in Bombay on October 12, 1986. (Photo: Times content)
Its early campaigns focused on securing jobs for locals, resisting the dominance of South Indian migrants in the city’s clerical and industrial workforce, and asserting linguistic and cultural primacy. Hindu nationalism, at this stage, was peripheral rather than foundational.This began to change as India’s political landscape evolved in the late 1970s and 1980s. The slow erosion of Congress dominance, coupled with the rise of the BJP, altered the ideological marketplace. The mobilisation around the Ram Janmabhoomi movement created space for a more assertive Hindu political identity, particularly in urban centres. Bal Thackeray, a keen reader of political mood and mass sentiment, consciously pivoted to occupy this space.
Hindutva stalwarts (from left) Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Balasaheb Thackeray, Lal Krishna Advani and Vijayaraje Scindia at a dinner hosted by the Maharashtra state unit of Bharatiya Janata Party on Septemebr 24, 1989 in Bombay. (Photo: Times content)
By the early 1990s, especially during the period surrounding the Babri Masjid movement, Hindutva had moved from the margins to the centre of the Sena’s politics. The party formally aligned with the BJP, and Bal Thackeray emerged as one of the most unapologetic and influential mass leaders of the Hindutva movement. Crucially, he did not abandon Marathi identity in this shift; instead, he layered Hindutva over Marathi asmita, fusing the two into a single, emotionally charged political narrative.This fusion proved potent. It gave the Shiv Sena ideological clarity, street-level mobilisation, and cross-community appeal within Mumbai’s Hindu electorate. Bal Thackeray did not inherit Hindutva as a founding principle; he evolved into it. His political success lay in recognising that Marathi pride alone had limits, and that when combined with Hindutva, it could be transformed into a durable and expansive political brand.Thackeray’s devolution from HindutvaUnlike his father, Uddhav Thackeray did not abandon Hindutva in one decisive moment. His departure was incremental and tactical, shaped more by political compulsion than ideological conviction. For much of his early political career, Uddhav remained within the broad Hindutva framework laid down by Bal Thackeray, often projecting himself as a custodian rather than an innovator of the Sena’s legacy.The first visible shift came after the 2019 Maharashtra assembly elections, when Uddhav broke with the BJP and stitched together an “unlikely alliance” with the Congress and the NCP. The formation of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government required ideological accommodation, and Hindutva, once the Sena’s most assertive plank, was deliberately softened. The rhetoric gave way to the language of governance, secular inclusivity and constitutionalism, signalling a recalibration rather than an outright rejection.
Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray with NCP-SP chief Sharad Pawar, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi during the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) meeting in Mumbai, 2023. (ANI)
This softening deepened during Uddhav’s tenure as chief minister. While he never publicly disowned Hindutva, he also stopped aggressively articulating it. Temple politics, street mobilisation, and confrontational cultural messaging, hallmarks of Bal Thackeray’s style, were conspicuously absent. Instead, Uddhav leaned into administrative legitimacy and coalition management, seeking to broaden the Sena’s appeal beyond its traditional base.However, this ideological dilution created a vacuum. The Sena’s core voters, long accustomed to ideological clarity, were left uncertain about what the party stood for. That ambiguity proved costly when Eknath Shinde split the party and openly reclaimed Hindutva as its defining identity. By positioning himself as the inheritor of Bal Thackeray’s ideological legacy, Shinde offered continuity at a moment when Uddhav appeared to be reimagining the Sena without fully replacing its ideological core.In the end, Uddhav’s deviation from Hindutva was not about renunciation but about subtraction without substitution. And in a political ecosystem built on legacy and emotional mobilisation, that proved to be a strategic miscalculation.The Thackeray reunionThe reunion of Uddhav Thackeray and Raj Thackeray ahead of the BMC polls was less a moment of sentiment and more an act of political necessity. For nearly two decades, the Thackeray cousins had travelled divergent paths, divided by personal rivalry and competing claims over the Marathi political space. But the BMC election altered the calculus. Having lost the Shiv Sena and facing a weakened organisational base, Uddhav Thackeray needed a fresh axis of mobilisation. Raj Thackeray, struggling with electoral irrelevance and a shrinking footprint, needed relevance. The reunion was thus driven by a convergence of weakness rather than shared resurgence.Together, they sought to revive the original Thackeray “brand of politics” that included Marathi manoos, regional pride, and cultural ownership of Mumbai. The pitch was deliberately crafted to bypass Hindutva and instead reclaim the emotional terrain of Marathi asmita, projecting the BMC polls as a fight to “save Mumbai” and protect Maharashtrian interests. The symbolism of the cousins sharing a platform after 20 years was meant to signal unity, closure, and a consolidated Marathi vote bank.
BMC elections in numbers
Both the Thackerays, recalling the 1961 Samyukta Maharashtra movement in which their grandfather, late Prabodhankar Thackeray, participated, claimed that the BJP was planning to separate Mumbai from Maharashtra and merge it with Gujarat.Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, who led the BJP’s campaign, refuted the charge. Speaking in Nashik on January 11 and then again at Shivtirth in Mumbai the next day, Fadnavis made it a point to repeatedly refute these claims and ensured that Thackerays’ Mumbai and Marathi “asmita” (pride) and “astitva” (existence) card does not stick this time around.Thackerays’ arguments about growing unemployment and neglect of “son-of the soils” were counter-punched with a “Global Mumbai” narrative by Fadnavis. Also, BJP fielded over 90 Marathi candidates for the BMC and announced that the next mayor of BMC will be Marathi.The ‘pungi-bajao’ politicsThe Thackerays’ push for regional identity turned so intense that Thackeray mockingly referred to the BJP leader K Annamalai as “rasmalai” and questioned his standing to speak on issues related to Mumbai. Thackeray attacked Annamalai for suggesting that Mumbai is an “international city”. He also referred to his uncle Bal Thackeray’s “Hatao lungi, bajao pungi” slogan from the 1960s and 1970s.“One rasmalai came from Tamil Nadu… what is your connection to here? Hatao lungi, bajao pungi,” Thackeray said at a joint UBT–MNS rally in Mumbai.
Raj Thackeray’s remark on K Annamalai
Additionally, Thackeray also said that he would “kick” people from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh out of Maharashtra if they “try to impose Hindi”.In July last year, the Thackeray brothers held an “Awaz Marathicha” rally to oppose what they called the state government’s bid to “impose” Hindi over Maharashtra.“We have come together to stay together”, Uddhav Thackeray said while addressing the gathering.Raj Thackeray launched a veiled attack on Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and said the CM did what even Balasaheb Thackeray could not — bring the two estranged brothers together.Thackerays also shared a hug at the joint rally after the Maharashtra government scrapped two Government Resolutions (GRs) to introduce Hindi as the third language.“The Maharashtra Government rolled back the decision on the three-language formula due to the strong unity shown by Marathi people. This decision was a precursor to the plan of separating Mumbai from Maharashtra,” the MNS chief said with Uddhav seated on the stage.Attacking the BJP-led Mahayuti during his address, Raj Thackeray said: “How did they suddenly bring in the imposition of Hindi without any discussion? For what purpose, and for whom? This is an injustice to young children. Without any consultation, you’re trying to force it upon us. You may rule the assembly – but we rule the streets.”However, the reunion came with structural limits. While it generated attention and nostalgia, it failed to translate into a city-wide electoral wave.The limits of legacyThe BMC verdict laid bare the limits of legacy politics in a city that has steadily changed its political expectations. The Thackerays managed to revive old memories and emotional connect through unity, rallies and a renewed push for Marathi identity, but nostalgia alone could not compensate for the absence of a clear and contemporary ideological anchor. Mumbai’s electorate has grown more aspirational and diverse, and it appears less willing to rally behind a single, narrow identity pitch.
What went against Thackerays
For Uddhav Thackeray, the defeat completed a slow political unravelling, from losing the father-founded Shiv Sena to ceding control of the civic institution that once symbolised Bal Thackeray’s unquestioned authority. For Raj Thackeray, the outcome reinforced the challenge of converting sharp rhetoric into electoral relevance. Their reunion sent a message of solidarity, but solidarity without organisational depth and ideological clarity fell short.Ultimately, the BMC result was not merely about seats or numbers. It signalled a deeper shift in Mumbai’s politics, where legacy and sentiment must now contend with a demand for sharper purpose and direction.
