The Delhi High Court rejected the petition on Tuesday filed by the Uddhav Thackeray faction of Shiv Sena, challenging the decision of the Election Commission to freeze both the name and the bow & arrow symbol of the 56-year-old party.
The Single-Judge Bench of Justice Sanjeev Narula further directed the Election Commission to decide on the proceedings related to the allotment of symbol and party name as soon as possible.
Shiv Sena had split into two after rebel party leader Eknath Shinde, along with several MLAs, formed the government in Maharashtra with the help of BJP.
Shinde’s faction formed the Balasahebanchi Shiv Sena, while the Uddhav Thackeray camp formed the Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray). The two factions laid claim to the name and symbol of the erstwhile party.
On October 8, Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar and Election Commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey restrained both the camps from using the party name and symbol, till it took the final decision over the same.
As per the Election Commission, neither of the two groups were permitted to either use the name of the party ‘Shivsena’ simplicitor; or the symbol ‘Bow & Arrow,’ reserved for ‘Shivsena’.
The Commission further said that the groups were free to choose any names they desired in the interim, including names having linkage with their parent party ‘Shivsena’.
It said the two groups would be allotted such different symbols as they may choose from the list of free symbols notified by the Election Commission for the purposes of the current by-elections.
The Uddhav faction was represented by Senior Advocates Kapil Sibal and Devadatta Kamat Advocates Vivek Singh, Devyani Gupta and Tanvi Anand had filed the petition on behalf of the Uddhav Thackeray camp.
As for the Eknath Shinde faction, it was represented by Senior Advocates Rajiv Nayar, Maninder Singh and Neeraj Kishan Kaul, along with Advocates Chirag Shah, Utsav Trivedi, Himanshu Sachdeva and Manini Roy.