With Shiv Sena MLAs and MPs defecting en masse to Chief Minister and rebel Sena leader Eknath Shinde’s camp, Yuva Sena leader and former Minister Aaditya Thackeray has hit the streets in a bid to stop the churn in the party rank and file and reassert the Thackeray clan’s grip over the divided party.
In successive rallies in Nashik and Aurangabad districts, the 32-year-old Mr. Aaditya Thackeray on Friday made emotional appeals as to how the rebels had stabbed his father and former Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray in the back even as the rebel camp accused the Thackeray faction of not providing ‘Z level’ security to Mr. Shinde when the latter allegedly faced a Naxal threat as Guardian Minister of Gadchiroli.
Addressing rallies in Manmad in Nashik and Vaijapur in Aurangabad, Mr. Aaditya Thackeray lashed out at the rebel MLAs and MPs, remarking that the government formed by Mr. Shinde and Devendra Fadnavis’ BJP was “illicit” and would fall in a matter of days.
“I don’t understand what was in their minds when they betrayed. We gave them everything — power, position, recognition, yet they betrayed us. This kind of politics will not be tolerated by people in the State nor the country,” Mr. Aaditya Thackeray said, in his first rally outside Mumbai city since Mr. Shinde’s revolt last month.
Social service
Claiming that the Thackerays had always adhered to the Sena’s ethos of 80% social service and 20% politics, Mr. Aaditya Thackeray said his father and the Thackeray family had always continued to serve people, as evinced by the former Chief Minister’s exemplary helmsmanship in successfully steering Maharashtra out of the COVID-19 crisis for two years.
“It is astonishing that someone ought to turn their coats against a Chief Minister [Uddhav Thackeray] who was named as one of the most popular Chief Ministers in the country during the pandemic,” he said in Nashik.
With Mr. Shinde splitting the party in both the Assembly and the Lok Sabha, the rebel camp has already begun engineering defections of corporators hitherto loyal to Mr. Uddhav Thackeray with the aim of winning the crucial civic polls in the State, particularly the high-stakes Mumbai civic body poll.
A desperate Mr. Uddhav Thackeray, unable to halt the defection of MLAs, MPs and corporators, is scrambling to re-build the party from scratch by appointing new office-bearers in a bid to contend with the Sena (Shinde camp)-BJP juggernaut ahead of the civic polls.
This has caused the ongoing ‘civil war’ within the Sena to snowball into a struggle for moral and political legitimacy, with each faction trying to win the hearts and minds of ordinary Shiv Sainiks.
Projecting the Thackeray clan as social workers as opposed to Machiavellian politicos, Mr. Aaditya Thackeray chastised the rebels’ ‘disloyalty’ in his address.
‘Trusted them blindly’
“Perhaps, we trusted them [rebels] blindly and showered affection on them … We never understood politics. We are not politicians like them. We believe in serving the people. While their revolt makes it seem that there is no place for good men in politics, I am hitting the streets to create a space for decent people in politics,” he said.
Slamming the BJP, he pointedly said that the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) had never sent notices or harassed the Opposition when they were in power.
Before his address in Manmad, rebel MLA from Nashik Suhas Kande had put posters demanding to know what wrong the MLAs had done by their rebellion. He further refused to acknowledge the Thackerays’ leadership, alleging that neither Uddhav nor Mr. Aaditya Thackeray had bothered to meet with leaders or the cadre to resolve their grievances.
This met with a cold retort from Mr. Aaditya Thackeray: “The Shiv Sena is not obliged to answer traitors. The rebels ‘stabbed’ Uddhav Thackeray in his back at a time when the former CM was undergoing serious life-threatening surgeries…after their betrayal, these rebels could not even meet our eyes in the Assembly. Why did they choose to rebel when Uddhav Thackeray was unwell? Why didn’t they do so in the last two-and-a-half years?”
Stating that the Shiv Sena was built on the toil of ordinary Sainiks, MLA Deepak Kesarkar — the spokesperson of the Shinde camp — deplored the efforts of the Thackeray faction to defame Chief Minister Mr. Shinde.
Mr. Kesarkar said the Uddhav faction had no right to mislead people by repeatedly dubbing them as ‘rebels’, stressing that neither Mr. Shinde nor the 50 MLAs had joined hands with the BJP for crass political gain.
“You may take out any number of rallies and try to create confusion in people’s minds, but do not take the ordinary Shiv Sainik for granted. Stop branding us as ‘rebels’. Thus far, we have kept silent out of respect for you as Balasaheb’s grandson,” said Mr. Kesarkar, chastising Mr. Aaditya Thackeray.
He emphasized that the rebellion had occurred as Mr. Shinde and the other MLAs wished to carry forward (Sena founder) Bal Thackeray’s ideal of ‘Hindutva’.
“Eknath Shinde had urged Uddhav Thackeray not to join hands with the NCP or the Congress even in 2019. He had appealed to Mr. Thackeray that the NCP would finish off the Shiv Sena. He never hankered after any post,” said Mr. Kesarkar.
Former Minister Gulabrao Patil, another MLA with the Shinde camp, said had the junior Thackeray made these efforts to connect with the Sena cadre earlier, no schism would have occurred within the party.
