Maharashtra Navnirman Sena president Raj Thackeray said on Friday that he won't hold his November 17 rally at Mumbai's Shivaji Park as the Election Commission (EC) is yet to grant his party permission for the event.
Instead, Thackeray said, he would visit assembly segments in Mumbai and Thane to canvass for MNS candidates.
I still have not got the permission and I have 1.5 days for the meeting. In these 1.5 days, holding rallies is becoming difficult. Instead, I will visit assembly seats in Mumbai and Thane, Thackeray said.
The Shiv Sena (UBT) and MNS had sought permission to hold rallies on November 17 at the iconic Shivaji Park. Both parties have not yet received the EC nod for the proposed events.
Campaigning for the November 20 Maharashtra assembly polls ends at 5 pm on November 18.
Besides being known as the cradle of Indian cricket, Shivaji Park in central Mumbai was the venue for Bal Thackeray's first Dussehra rally after he founded Shiv Sena in 1966. A Dussehra rally at the ground then became a Sena tradition.
Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray and Raj Thackeray's politically estranged cousin said last week that his party had sought permission for a rally at Shivaji Park on November 17, which is also the death anniversary of Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray.
That day, he said, lakhs of Bal Thackeray's followers would congregate at the ground. After he died in 2012, Bal Thackeray was cremated at Shivaji Park.
So we are telling the Election Commission and police not to complicate the matter. Shiv Sainiks will anyway flock there and you cannot stop them. No Model Code of Conduct is applicable here. So to avoid any tussle and allow us to hold a rally on November 17, he had said.