Mumbai: The 20 victorious Shiv Sena (UBT) candidates elected MLA Aaditya Thackeray as the legislative party leader on Monday.
Bhaskar Jadhav was appointed the group leader in the assembly, and Sunil Prabhu the whip.
Jadhav said that the party would surely demand the leader of opposition post after the swearing-in of the chief minister and the election of the speaker.
“We will definitely demand from the current govt and the speaker of the legislative assembly that we be given the position of leader of opposition once the oath-taking ceremony is held, the speaker of the legislative assembly is elected and the chief minister is sworn in. I was of the view that someone from Mumbai should be made group leader, but I have been given the responsibility. This is a big challenge since the govt has a brute majority. So we have to be the torchbearers of democracy. In 1984, the Janta Party had only two MPs, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and LK Advani, but they were given the respect and status of the opposition by the Congress. The current govt must remember this,” Jadhav said.
Thackeray is an MLA from Worli, Prabhu from Dindoshi, and Jadhav from Guhaghar.
“A meeting was held of the newly elected members of the legislative assembly. This meeting was chaired by Uddhav Thackeray. This was a meeting of the legislative party. The newly elected members of the legislative assembly and the members of the legislative council were present in it. Bhaskar Jadhav was unanimously elected as the leader of the Shiv Sena group in the legislative assembly. Sunil Prabhu was appointed as the deputy leader and whip, while Aaditya Thackeray was appointed as the joint group leader of both the legislatures,” said Shiv Sena (UBT) MLC and leader of the opposition in the council Ambadas Danve.
After fighting 95 seats and winning just 16, the Shiv Sena (UBT) scored its worst performance in any election both in terms of strike rate and the number of seats won. The Shiv Sena (UBT) winning the prestige seats of Mahim, Worli and Bandra East came as a consolation for the party, which won only a third of the seats that the Shiv Sena won.