Bihar polls: Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray, his son Aaditya among Shiv Sena’s star campaigners

Maharashtra chief minister (CM) and Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, along with his son and state tourism minister Aaditya, is likely to start campaigning for his

Maharashtra chief minister (CM) and Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, along with his son and state tourism minister Aaditya, is likely to start campaigning for his party in Bihar election. The leaders will campaign virtually owing to the Covid-19 pandemic, party insiders said.

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The Sena will contest on around 50 seats in Bihar, which will go into polls in three phases, starting October 28.

On Thursday, the party issued a list of 20 star campaigners, which include the CM, Aaditya, party’s Rajya Sabha parliamentarians Sanjay Raut, Anil Desai and Priyanka Chaturvedi, Lok Sabha Members of Parliament (MP) Arvind Sawant, Krupal Tumane and Vinayak Raut, former MP Chandrakant Khaire and state ministers Subhash Desai and Gulabrao Patil. The Sena has also included party’s leaders from outside the state, such as Rajkumar Bafna from Rajasthan and Yograj Sharma from Punjab, in the list.

“The discussions are still on about the campaigning methods. With the Covid-19 situation, there are several guidelines that need to be followed for public rallies. One school of thought is to not gather crowd at all. Instead, there could be an address by Uddhav ji on social media. We are still finalising it,” a senior party functionary said.

While the party has contested Assembly polls in states other than Maharashtra, Thackeray has not campaigned for his party’s candidates before this. During the December 2018 Assembly election in Rajasthan, Aaditya had campaigned for the party candidate in Jodhpur.

The Sena does not have any significant following outside Maharashtra and therefore, managing to gather a crowd for a public rally could become an embarrassment for the party.