BackUddhav Thackeray asks Hindus to vote as one community
Shiv Sena chief declares his party’s support to BJP’s PM candidate Narendra Modi at Dussehra rally
Premium(Hindustan Times)
Mumbai: Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray championed an aggressive Hindutva line during his party’s Dussehra rally on Sunday, asking Hindus to vote as a community and not on caste and linguistic lines.
Referring to a recent statement in Pune by Maharashtra chief minister Prithviraj Chavan of the Congress party, where he asked minorities to vote aggressively to defeat communal forces, Thackeray said: “If Chavan wants minorities to come out in large numbers for voting, I ask Hindus to do the same thing and flock to voting booths."
“I know for saying this I will be prosecuted for flaming communal passions, but I don’t care. But I would also like to suggest that Chavan should also be booked under the same sections," Thackeray said.
This was the Shiv Sena’s first Dussehra rally at the iconic Shivaji Park in central Mumbai after the death of former party supremo Bal Thackeray last November.
Thackeray also declared his party’s support to the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, the chief minister of Gujarat. “Modi is the only decisive leader in the country and only he can ensure that the country gets out of the current economic mess created by the (Congress-led) United Progressive Alliance government."
Bal Thackeray had earlier declared the Shiv Sena’s support for Sushma Swaraj of the BJP, the leader of opposition in the Lok Sabha, as the PM candidate of the National Democratic Alliance that the BJP leads.
Political analysts believe the Shiv Sena’s Dussehra rally demonstrated that Uddhav Thackeray was firmly in control of the party apparatus.
“The Sena cleverly uses the Hindutva plank during the Lok Sabha election and goes back to the Marathi Manoos line during state assembly and municipal corporation elections, and Uddhav did the same thing today," said Sandeep Pradhan, political editor of Marathi daily Maharashtra Times.
Meanwhile, angry Shiv Sena workers at the rally shouted slogans against party leader Manohar Joshi and forced him to leave the venue. Joshi had two days earlier indirectly criticized Uddhav Thackeray’s leadership style by contrasting it with the aggressive style of Bal Thackeray. Joshi later met Uddhav Thackeray in an attempt at damage control.
“The hooting out of Joshi has clearly shown who is in charge of the party organization, and though his (Thackeray’s) speech was uninspiring, Sena workers have accepted that they can’t expect fireworks from Uddhav like Balasaheb," said Pradhan.
PTI contributed to this story.
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