Scores of hooligans of the Shiv Sena stormed the headquarters of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) at the Wankhede stadium on Monday and forced the cancellation of a meeting between the heads of the Pakistan Cricket Board and the BCCI.

Raising its shrill anti-Pakistan campaign the Sena hooligans barged into the BCCI office and surrounded Shashank Manohar the BCCI president just before he was to meet Shahryar Khan the PCB chief. They raised slogans against Pakistan and demanded that the talks between the two boards be cancelled.

The BCCI had invited Khan and Najam Sethi the head of the PCB's executive committee to Mumbai to discuss the proposed bilateral series between the two subcontinental neighbours. India and Pakistan have agreed to play six series over the next eight years and the first one is scheduled to kick off in the UAE in December.

Following the disruption the BCCI has rescheduled the meeting between Manohar and Khan in New Delhi on Tuesday.

Surprisingly despite the Sena stepping up its campaign against visiting Pakistani personalities the police were not able to prevent almost a hundred slogan-shouting and flag-waving workers from entering the high-security stadium. Later about a dozen Sena activists were arrested.

Last week the party - which is an ally of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) both at the centre and in Maharashtra - had opposed a book release function by former Pakistani foreign minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri in Mumbai. On the day of the function party workers threw black paint on the face of Sudheendra Kulkarni a former BJP activist and head of the Observer Research Foundation who was organising the function.

Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis however directed the police to step up security at the venue later in the day and ensured that the function went off smoothly. A few days earlier an event featuring Pakistani ghazal maestro Ghulam Ali had to be cancelled after the Sena warned the organisers that it would disrupt the show.

And on Monday after storming Manohar's office the Sena warned Aleem Dar the Pakistani umpire deputed by the International Cricket Council as the neutral umpire for the ongoing India-South Africa one-day series from officiating at the fifth ODI in Mumbai on October 25.

The Sena has traditionally been opposed to any ties between India and Pakistan. It has over the years tried to disrupt cultural and sporting events between the two nations. However the party which has failed to make much headway in electoral politics - it has been reduced to the status of a junior partner of the BJP - over the years in Mumbai and Maharashtra continues to attempt to hog the headlines and television space by its high-profile theatrics.

Political parties on Monday slammed the Shiv Sena for its hooliganism. An Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) spokesperson here demanded that the Election Commission derecognise the party for its "illegal and dangerous activities."

In its 50 years of existence the Shiv Sena has indulged only in the "politics of hate and goondaism and has not made one credible contribution to the nation" declared Preeti Sharma Menon the AAP spokesperson. And though it had not ruled the state on its own even once it claimed to be the voice of Maharashtra she said.

Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari said Mumbai had been reduced to "a mobocracy" by the Sena with its abominable behaviour. Sena spokesperson Sanjay Raut however defended the protest at the BCCI office. "We have not committed a crime" he claimed.

"We took the law into our hands only to oppose Pakistan."

The BJP in Maharashtra is increasingly getting concerned by the hooliganism of its junior partner which is determined to rake up these issues in a bid to embarrass the party. When hundreds of thousands of people are suffering in the backward districts of Maharashtra following severe drought the Sena appears more interested in high-profile publicity stunts.