Thackeray has chosen Guru Poornima day, Thursday, to break out of a three-month retirement he had evoked in March this year in the wake of differences with Chief Minister Manohar Joshi. While he had been active on the fringes of political activity during that time, he had, however, refrained from active involvement in party affairs.

Sainiks are planning to flood Thackeray's residence, Matoshree, with offerings to their Guru and seek his blessings. Meanwhile, sources in the Sena said there is the general expectation that quite a few heads will roll within the party organisation and some young blood infused into the party.

The long pending decision for the appointment of new shakha and vibhag pramukhs is expected to be announced tomorrow soon after Thackeray offers a publicaudience at his residence. However, sources said both the Sena chief and other party leaders will go slow on disciplinary action against rebellious Sainiks in view of the thinning support to the Sena-BJP government in Maharashtra.

``The consensus within the party has been to let the sleeping dogs lie,'' a Sena leader told The Indian Express. ``We know that cross voting in the Rajya Sabha elections has taken place in a major proportion in our party. Had it not been for the Congress, one of our own candidates would have been sure to lose. We also know who these cross voters are. But the decision is not to destabilise our government further.''

The Sena-led government is in a precarious situation owing to the swaying support of the Independents, by and large Congress rebels, who propped it up in the last three years. However, with a major chunk of these MLAs said to have been wooed over by the Congress, the Sena leadership appears wary about testing its mettle by disturbing the equation with opendisciplinary action against its own rebels.

Instead, reliable sources said, the strategy is to marginalise these rebels by superseding them within the party organisation. Sainiks have been waiting for well over six months for the new list of party functionaries which Thackeray was reluctant to make public owing to the fear that it would immediately set a lot of discontented elements within the party working overtime towards its weakening.

However, with nothing at stake between now and the next Assembly elections, the Sena leadership appears to have decided that it needs a strong party cadre to overcome the challenge of not just the reviving Congress but also its ally, the BJP. Thackeray is said to be well aware of the fact that while the Congress has built up a formidable alliance with the Samajwadi Party and the Republican Party of India, he might very soon have to face the consequences of the BJP's disillusionment with the Sena as well.

``We are certain that as long as the Congress-SP-RPI allianceholds, the BJP will stay with us,'' a Sena leader said. ``There is a realisation in both the BJP and the Sena that while we might be able to take on the Congress singlehanded, we have to stay together to beat its tie up with the Dalits and the minorities. But that does not blind us to the other factors working against us.''

The govt is also facing a burgeoning movement on the law and order situation. Congress plans to put the government on the mat in the monsoon session over the same issue. Attempts will also be made to embarrass the government over the tabling of the Srikrishna reports. These are among the issues which will figure in Thackeray's maiden parleys with his ministers tonight and tomorrow, the sources added.