Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on Monday reaffirmed his claim to 22 out of the 48 seats in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls in 2024. Shiv Sena MP Rahul Shewale said that they naturally have a stake in these seats as the oldest allied partner of the BJP in the state.This claim was made after a meeting involving 13 sitting MPs held at Chief Minister Eknath Shinde's official residence, Varsha Bungalow.
Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena and BJP have sealed a larger pre-poll agreement to contest together the 2023 local bodies polls and the 2024 Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha elections.The development comes at a time when the new Shiv Sena-BJP alliance is completing a year after it overthrew the Maha Vikas Aghadi government created by Sharad Pawar and led by Uddhav Thackeray.The 2023 local bodies polls, which include the big corporation of Mumbai, would be a sort of setting the plan in motion ahead of next year’s general elections.The Shiv Sena-BJP formation would take on the MVA which comprises the Congress, the Sharad Pawar-led NCP and Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT).
In 2019, the BJP contested the Lok Sabha polls in alliance with the Uddhav Thackeray-led undivided Shiv Sena and won 41 seats - with BJP contesting 25 seats and winning 23 and Shiv Sena fighting 23 seats and winning 18 of them. As far as the Vidhan Sabha polls are concerned, the BJP contested 164 seats and won 105, while the Shiv Sena bagged 56 seats after contesting 124 seatsIn June 2022, the Shiv Sena split - Shinde-led faction allying with BJP while the Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) is part of MVA.