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Informist, Wednesday, Jun. 17, 2026

NEW DELHI – Amid speculation about a split in the Shiv Sena (UBT) Lok Sabha parliamentary party, Rajya Sabha lawmaker and spokesperson Sanjay Raut Wednesday said that if MPs defect this time, the people of Maharashtra will not stay silent. He said that those who want to leave, should resign from their elected position and go.

"If such speculations are floating about them (the suspected dissidents), they should come forward and deny it," Raut said at a press conference here, with party's Lok Sabha members Anil Desai and Arvind Sawant by his side. "I repeat, if they do it again, Maharashtra's public will not remain silent this time. You have made a mockery (of democracy)," he added.  

The breakaway Shiv Sena faction led by Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde has been claiming that around seven of the nine Lok Sabha MPs of Uddhav Thackeray' party are in touch with them and may switch sides soon.

"Anyone who wants to go should resign and leave. You were elected on our symbol, our voters elected you. You are no body," Raut said, adding that Thackeray had given these people tickets and money to contest elections, and had campaigned for them day in and day out.

This comes exactly four years after a major split in the Shiv Sena, when a group of MLAs led by Eknath Shinde broke away, resulting in the fall of the state government led by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray. The Bharatiya Janata Party was accused of having engineered the split, allegedly through coercion by central investigative agencies, as well as hefty bribing.

Raut said that MP Anil Desai has issued a whip for all the party MPs to attend a meeting of the parliamentary party on Thursday, and Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla has been informed of the party's position in the matter.

Earlier, Raut had shared on X some details of the "Operation Tiger", allegedly being undertaken by the BJP to lure Shiv Sena (UBT) MPs to their side. "The magic of the media is this: Nashik's MP Rajabhau Waje has left for Delhi for the industry committee meeting, and here the news is showing something entirely different."

"Nagesh Ashtekar, Hingoli MP, said, ‘I'm in Hingoli, but these people can forge my fake signature'. Now, these people who are doing this... this time, the public and the Shiv Sainiks won't let them off the hook. That's for sure," he added.

In a separate post on X, Raut alleged that the MPs were being offered "the Minimum Support Price" of INR 500 million per head, of which INR 150 million was being in advance.

The development came close on the heels of a major defection by All India Trinamool Congress Lok Sabha members. The Opposition is accusing Union Home Minister Amit Shah of engineering splits in political parties to shore up numbers to get a contentious legislation on delimitation of parliamentary constituencies passed, for which the government needs a positive vote by at least two-thirds of the total Lok Sabha members. The bill had fallen in the lower House of Parliament in April.  End

Reported by Asim Khan

Edited by Akul Nishant Akhoury

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