Members of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena on Saturday celebrated the 40th birthday of their leader Raj Thackeray by organising blood donation camps and other social activities.However, the MNS refrained from holding a Hatt Puja programme, a take-off on the Chhat Puja performed by north Indians, which has become a bone of contention between MNS and migrants from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.Over 20,000 supporters visited the MNS chief's home at Dadar and greeted their leader.
After hijacking the Shiv Sena's Marathi agenda, MNS wants to sustain the campaign by offering free Marathi classes to the non-Marathis in the city. "Marathi is the official language of the state and non-Maharashtrians should at least know how to communicate in Marathi," MNS district president (South Mumbai) Arvind Gavade told PTI. The MNS is planning to start the classes from March. There will be three lectures per week and the number of lectures can be increased.
The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena bubble has burst in the Lok Sabha polls.
Shalini Thackeray, general secretary, Chitrapat Karmachari Sena, the cine wing of Raj Thackeray's Maharashtra Navnirman Sena, told rediff.com that the MNS is not targeting ABCL chairman Amitabh Bachchan in its bid to strengthen its position for the upcoming civic polls in Mumbai in 2012.
The Congress in Maharashtra is making all efforts to woo the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena to back United Progressive Alliance nominee Pranab Mukherjee for the presidential poll on Thursday.
Raj Thackeray's political party, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), has attacked Amitabh Bachchan once again. This time, they mocked him through a poster, for going back on his decision to donate his agricultural land to farmers in the Pune district.
The MNS -- which aggressively compelled a ban on employing Pakistani actors and others in Bollywood last year -- has been subdued in comparison after a Marathi manoos was sentenced to death in Pakistan.
The Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) on Monday asked private carrier Jet Airways to make announcements in Marathi and also Marathi movies and newspapers mandatory in flights operating from Mumbai.
Hitting back at Bharatiya Janata Party president Rajnath Singh, who recently snubbed him for extending an "unsolicited support" to Narendra Modi and "seeking votes" in his name without joining the Shiv-Sena-BJP-RPI alliance, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray on Monday taunted Singh for raising the objection, while Modi was silent on the issue.
Starring Ranbir, Aishwarya, Anushka and Fawad, the film is slated to release on October 28.
Election to the 122-member Nashik municipal corporation has thrown a hung house, but indications are that the new ruling disposition may be either a Maharashtra Navnirman Sena-Nationalist Congress Party combine or MNS-Bharatiya Janata Party tie-up.
The end of the process to withdraw nominations for Maharashtra assembly polls on Monday left the Congress in despair in Kolhapur North seat after its candidate Madhurima Raje Chhatrapati withdrew, while the Bharatiya Janata Party managed to convince Gopal Shetty to opt out from Mumbai's Borivali.
The election campaign was one of the most vitriolic in the state, but you would not have guessed it from the smiles and selfies from the politicians.
Raj also justified his support to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, citing the construction of the Ram Temple and abrogation of Article 370 among other reasons.
Maharashtra's Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Council and senior BJP leader Vinod Tawde refuted reports of an alliance of the Shiv Sena-BJP and the Republican Party of India (Athawale) with the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS).
Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena looks all set to get its candidate elected as Mayor of Nashik with likely support from Bharatiya Janata Party.
A delegation of Maharashtra Navnirman Sena leaders met Maharashtra Governor S C Jamir on Monday, requesting him to restore 'Z' category security of MNS chief Raj Thackeray.
Against the backdrop of exodus of North Indian labourers, the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) in Nashik has asked trained Marathi workers to register themselves with the party to enable them to get jobs in local industries.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Thursday assured his government will continue the Ladki Bahin Yojana and fulfil Mahayuti's pre-poll promise of hiking the monthly stipend under the scheme to Rs 2,100 from Rs 1,500 now to eligible women.
Wielding sticks and hurling stones, hordes of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena workers on Tuesday vandalised a toll plaza at the iconic Bandra-Worli Sea Link, even as the state's police chief said their leader Raj Thackeray's "provocative" speech that triggered the violence was being examined.
Alarmed by damage made by Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) in last Lok Sabha polls, the BJP has chalked out a campaign strategy which would focus on making people realise that voting MNS is akin to voting for Congress-NCP.
Maintaining that anything is possible in politics, senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader Gopinath Munde on Sunday called for a tri-partite alliance of Shiv Sena, BJP and Raj Thackeray led-Maharashtra Navnirman Sena to pull down the ruling Congress-Nationalist Congress Party combine.
Maharashtra Navnirman Sena state unit general secretary Vasant Gite was detained in Nashik on Wednesday, as a preventive measure, ahead of the possible arrest of party chief Raj Thackeray. Three MNS leaders have also been taken into preventive custody, Police Commissioner S M Sayyad told PTI. With this, the total number of arrests has gone up to 126 since Tuesday, he said.
At least half a dozen toll plazas were vandalised on Monday by suspected Maharashtra Navnirman Sena activists in Thane after party chief Raj Thackeray asked workers not to pay toll tariff and "crush" the toll gates.
The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena, on Wednesday, sought to revoke the four year suspension of four of its legislators, saying it had already apologised for any "disrespect" caused to a woman MLA during Monday's mayhem in the Maharastra assembly but made no mention of the assault on Samajwadi Party member Abu Asim Azmi.
Raj Thackeray announced unconditional support to the ruling 'Mahayuti' alliance of the BJP, Shiv Sena and NCP in the state and backed Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
According to insiders, "talks are on" between the Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray and the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena at "an exploratory level".
In a surprising turn of events, Hyderabad-based MIM on Sunday made its maiden entry into the Maharashtra Assembly pocketing two seats, while pro-Marathi MNS of Raj Thackeray was all but wiped out winning just one.
The army has been upset over being dragged into politics.
MNS members assaulted SM MLA Abu Azmi over taking the oath in Hindi.
A poster mocking actor Amitabh Bachchan on being part of the No-Honking Drive initiative of the Mumbai Traffic Police was put up in Mumbai on Wednesday. The poster -- Marathi -- bears the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena logo, Juhu residents said.
"If it is a defeat, it has to be accepted by everybody," Shiv Sena leader and former Lok Sabha Speaker Manohar Joshi said when asked if the party conceded defeat in the elections.
While political experts claim that the Modi Magic is missing in the 2024 general election, the common people in the street -- at least those in the crowd on Thursday -- vow that they will vote for Modi and the candidate who contests the election doesn't matter much.
Bollywood item girl Rakhi Sawant has joined the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena's cine wing -- Chitrapat Karmachari Sena.
After a PIL in the Supreme Court demanding de-recognition of the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena for its anti-North Indians campaign, a similar PIL was filed in the Bombay High Court on Friday seeking a ban on MNS and also to conduct a CBI probe into the entire incident.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday slammed the Bharatiya Janata Party for hobnobbing with the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena in Maharashtra saying the people of Bihar will reject the party's collusive politics of communalism and regional chauvinism.
The toll waiver will be in force from midnight on Monday, he said.
Two months after targetting north Indian migrants, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena has raked up son-of-the soil issue demanding 80 per cent job reservation for Marathi-speaking locals in private sector and threatened to launch agitation if this was not done, drawing strong protest from the industries. The MNS also warned the industries that if this was not done then they would launch an agitation.
Two days after the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray announced a state-wide 'rasta roko' on Wednesday to protest against toll collection in the state, police on Tuesday served a notice to him asking the leader to refrain from any activity that would create law and order problems.
Shiv Sena activists on Friday attacked a college in suburban Mumbai as the authorities did not allow around 70 students to appear for the exams after declaring them as ineligible, the police said.
