India, June 20 -- The date may be incidental, but holds meaning.

June 20 marked exactly four years since Eknath Shinde began his march out of the Maha Vikas Aghadi government of the Shiv Sena-Congress-NCP alliance, moving a group of Shiv Sena MLAs to Surat and then Guwahati - both in BJP-ruled states - before toppling Uddhav Thackeray's chief ministership nine days later.

In the same week this year, six of nine Lok Sabha MPs of Uddhav's Sena have reportedly submitted a letter to the Lok Sabha Speaker to form a separate group, and look set to eventually merge with Shinde's Sena to back the BJP-led NDA regime of PM Narendra Modi.

This is the second major fracture in Bal Thackeray's original Sena in four years. Maharashtra deputy CM Shind...