Going, Going... But Not Gone: Shiv Sena Gives BJP More Time

As an array of politicians took their oaths to join the Prime Minister's Council of Ministers, Anil Desai, a Shiv Sena leader who had landed in Delhi was asked to skip the ceremony and immediately catch a flight back to Mumbai. That could have detonated the ending of the Shiv Sena's alliance with the ruling BJP, but at a press conference this evening, Sena leader Uddhav Thackeray refused to call it. "It is up to the BJP to decide...if they take any support from the NCP, we will not stand with them," he said, referring to Sharad Pawar's party which has offered to back the BJP's minority government in Maharashtra, a move that has greatly diminished the power of the Shiv Sena.