Accept EC decision, change of symbol would not make difference: Sharad Pawar's advice to Uddhav Thackeray

Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar. File Pic

Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar on Friday said the loss of 'bow and arrow' will not make any difference to the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena as people will accept its new poll symbol.

Pawar, whose party is Thackeray's ally, also reminded that the Congress led by Indira Gandhi had to pick a new symbol in 1978, but it had no damaging consequences for the party.

He was reacting to the Election Commission's decision to recognize the Eknath Shinde-led faction as the real Shiv Sena, and award it the original 'bow and arrow' symbol.

"Once a decision is given, there can be no discussion. Accept it, take a new symbol. It (loss of the old symbol) is not going to have any impact," the NCP chief advised the Thackeray group.

He recalled that Indira Gandhi faced a similar situation in the aftermath of the Emergency.

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"Congress used to have the 'two bullocks with a yoke' symbol. After they lost it, they adopted 'hand' as the new symbol, and people accepted it. Similarly, people will accept the new symbol (of the Uddhav faction)," the veteran politician said.

The Election Commission of India on Friday recognised the Eknath Shinde-led faction as the real Shiv Sena and ordered allocation of the "bow and arrow" poll symbol to it.

In a 78-page order on the protracted battle for control of the organisation, the Commission allowed the Uddhav Thackeray faction to keep the "flaming torch" poll symbol allocated to it till the completion of the assembly bypolls in the state.

The Commission said MLAs backing Eknath Shinde got nearly 76 per cent of votes polled in favour of the 55 winning Shiv Sena candidates in the 2019 Maharashtra Assembly polls.

The Uddhav Thackeray faction's MLAs got 23.5 per cent of votes polled in favour of the winning Shiv Sena candidates, the three-member Commission said in a unanimous order.

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