Maha polls: MNS announces slogan for its vision document

Mumbai: Amid growing uncertainty over the fate of two prominent alliances in Maharashtra and the possibility of a multi-cornered fight in October 15 Assembly elections, Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena on Monday came up with a slogan for its vision document scheduled to be released on September 25.

The campaign tagline: Ho, Hey Shakya Aahe (Yes, it is possible), similar to the US President Barack Obama's famous Yes we can slogan that he had used while campaigning for Presidential polls in 2008, was announced by Raj here. Raj's campaign poster also reads: Let us create a Maharashtra that the world will envy. According to party insiders, the blueprint of Maharashtra's development, which was finalised after eight years since the inception of the parry, will focus on empowerment of women, industrialisation, agriculture, transportation and irrigation. With the MNS coming out of the shell it has gone into after its crushing defeat in Lok Sabha polls, the political scenario in the poll-bound state is likely to hot up. Shiv Sena, the bete noire of MNS, had come up with the slogan, UTha Maharashtra' (Wake up Maharashtra) in August after its alliance partner BJP's massive victory on the successful use of NaMo slogan. The UT in Sena's slogan is abbreviation of the party president Uddhav Thackeray's name. The role of MNS will be keenly watched as the alliance partners Sena-BJP and ruling Congress-NCP are teetering on a breakpoint over number of seats to contest. In its electoral debut in 2009, MNS polled over 1.5 lakh votes in each of the 12 Lok Sabha seats it had contested and bagged 13 seats in the Assembly elections in that year. However, in recently-held Lok Sabha elections, all its candidates lost their deposits in ten seats the party had contested, mainly due to Modi wave, with a vote share of mere 0.13 per cent.