Mumbai: The fight for the Worli constituency is likely to be one of the most high-profile battles of the Maharashtra Assembly elections this time with the scions of two of Mumbai’s longtime political families—the Deoras and Thackerays—directly pitted against each other.

Milind Deora, Rajya Sabha MP from the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena, who left the Congress in January this year, could take on the incumbent MLA, Aaditya Thackeray, in a constituency that is considered one of Shiv Sena’s strongholds.

Mahayuti comprises the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Ajit Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).

On Friday evening, Milind Deora posted a cryptic message on social media platform X. He said, “Chief Minister Eknath Shinde believes that justice for Worli & Worlikars is long overdue. Together, we’re paving the way forward & will share our vision soon. It’s Worli NOW!”

Aaditya Thackeray debuted and won the Worli assembly segment in 2019 with a huge margin of 89,248 votes. And, in the Lok Sabha election, the Shiv Sena (UBT) won the Mumbai South parliamentary constituency, under which the seat falls, trumping the Shinde-led faction. The Mahayuti, however, taunted the Shiv Sena (UBT) for its lead of just 6,715 votes in the Worli assembly.

The Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) has fielded Sandeep Deshpande from the constituency. The MNS has been known to divide the Marathi votes that go to the Shiv Sena to a certain extent. Deshpande being in the field is likely to hurt both factions who have already split the vote.

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The Worli assembly constituency 

The Worli assembly constituency, a cluster of elite high-rises, plush offices, slums, chawls (tenements), mill workers’ residences, lower- and middle-income group housing, the landmark Haji Ali Dargah, and a vast coastline dotted with fisherfolk colonies, is exceedingly diverse.

A Mumbai-based leader from the Shinde-led Shiv Sena, who did wish to be named since Deora’s candidature was yet to be officially announced, told ThePrint that the combination of Milind Deora’s and Shiv Sena’s voter bases will help them put up a formidable fight.

“Milind Deora has been an MP from Mumbai South of which Worli is a part and the voters there know him. He is very well networked with the corporates, people in the high rises and the affluent parts of Worli. The Shiv Sena, meanwhile, can help get the voters of the Marathi middle class in Worli as well as the fishing villages there,” he said. Maharashtra will vote in assembly elections on 20 November, while counting will take place on 23 November.

The Shiv Sena has always had a strong hold over Worli. The party has been winning civic elections here since its early days. On the assembly front, Shiv Sena’s Datta Nalawade held the Worli seat for four straight terms from 1990.

The seat slipped from the undivided Shiv Sena’s grip only once in 2009—it was after delimitation when parts of Worli and Sewri were rearranged as one constituency.

Sachin Ahir, then with the NCP, snatched the seat from Shiv Sena’s Ashish Chemburkar. Sena won the seat back in 2014 with incumbent MLA Shinde trouncing Ahir by a margin of over 23,000 votes.

Before the 2019 civic polls, Ahir defected from the NCP to the still undivided Shiv Sena and started closely working with Aaditya Thackeray to secure the Worli win for him.

After the Shiv Sena split in 2022, when Eknath Shinde rebelled with a majority of MLAs in tow, Worli was the first area in Mumbai where the chief minister’s party initiated the construction of administrative infrastructure.

The Deoras and the Thackerays

For the longest time, the Deora family was one of the Congress’ strongest players in Mumbai’s politics. Milind Deora’s father, the late Murli Deora, was elected as a corporator in the city in the 1960s. He went on to represent the Mumbai South constituency at one point.

The former Rajya Sabha member was also a minister in both United Progressive Alliance (UPA) governments at the Centre. His sphere of influence extended beyond politics and he had a strong relationship with Mumbai’s top industrialists.

Later, Milind Deora represented the Mumbai South parliamentary seat for two terms from 2004 to 2014 before Arvind Sawant from the undivided Shiv Sena defeated him.

Ahead of the 2019 election, Milind Deora got businessmen from across classes—shopkeepers to billionaire industrialists, including Mukesh Ambani and Uday Kotak—to endorse him in a promotional video. However, he lost the election to the undivided Shiv Sena.

Murli Deora was also keenly associated with the functioning of the Mumbai Congress, having been its president for over two decades. Later, Milind Deora was also Mumbai Congress president for about four months in 2019. He resigned, saying he wanted to play a more national role in the party.

The leader also had several differences with his party leaders, some of whom alleged that he was not a grassroots worker and dealt only with the party’s high command. He eventually resigned from the Congress in January this year saying the party had deviated from its “ideological and organisational roots, lacking appreciation for honesty and constructive criticism”.

In February this year, he was elected unopposed as Rajya Sabha MP from the Shinde-led Shiv Sena.

The Thackerays, on the other hand, are synonymous with the ‘sons of the soil’ political doctrine in Maharashtra, with Bal Thackeray having founded the Shiv Sena on that principle in 1966.

Fighting on this nativist agenda, the Thackeray family grew to have a strong hold on Mumbai, with the Shiv Sena ruling the city’s civic body from 1985, barring four years from 1992 to 1996. The term of the last general body expired in 2022 and there haven’t been fresh elections ever since.

When Bal Thackeray’s nephew Raj quit the party and formed his MNS in 2006, he too made the nativist agenda the focal point of his politics.

Even now, Uddhav Thackeray and Aaditya Thackeray have been tapping strongly into the Shiv Sena’s original ideology by talking about jobs and houses for the Marathi youth, emphasising the alleged flight of jobs from Maharashtra to Gujarat.

In 1977, the Bal Thackeray-led Shiv Sena supported Murli Deora to become Mumbai’s mayor. As Milind Deora spoke in the Rajya Sabha for the first time in June this year, he spoke about how life had come full circle for him.

He said, “In 1977, 47 years ago, the late Balasaheb Thackeray supported my late father to become the mayor of Mumbai. And today, 47 years later, at the age of 47, the president of Shiv Sena and Chief Minister of Maharashtra, Eknath Shinde, has enabled me to represent Mumbai and Maharashtra in Rajya Sabha.”

His candidature against Aaditya Thackeray, however, suggests this story is yet to come full circle.

(Edited by Sanya Mathur)

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