Shiv Sena executive president Uddhav Thackeray got back to active day-to-day political work with a bang.
After a month-long hiatus, Shiv Sena executive president Uddhav Thackeray got back to active day-to-day political work with a bang — by demanding that the state home minister RR Patil and police commissioner Arup Patnaik be sacked.
On Monday, he organised a show of strength at the Amar Jawan Jyoti (martyrs’ memorial) at Fort to protest its desecration during the riot at Azad Maidan on August 11.
Echoing the demand made by his estranged cousin and MNS chief Raj Thackeray to roll the heads of Patnaik and Patil, Uddhav questioned how a top cop, who could not protect his own men protect the people?
“In case the government does not take action, we will be compelled to launch a protest,” warned Uddhav.
Asked if he would join the MNS in its demonstration on Tuesday to demand Patil and Patnaik’s resignation, Uddhav said: “The Sena’s Hindutva is not incidental. We are willing to go with anyone who considers Hindutva as nationalism.”
Charging authorities with “going soft on rioters from the minority community while coming down heavily on others”, Uddhav accused the government of vote-bank politics and recalled how “post 1992-93 riots, the state government had acted swiftly against erring policemen and then chief minister Sudhakarrao Naik was replaced by Sharad Pawar”.
Demanding that Bangladeshi settlers be “kicked out of the country”, Uddhav’s fiery speech sought to egg on Hindus to “show the iron fist of their unity” to them.
Confirming that “Uddhav has become active again”, one of his aides said that he has started meeting party leaders and workers in the mornings, at his Bandra residence.
“He has started with routine party work and building and reorganising the organisation for the forthcoming polls,” said another Sena member.
Party sources admitted that the ill health of the Thackeray father-son duo did not augur well for the party in the run-up to the 2014 polls, where the saffron alliance will face a tough fight from the ruling Congress-NCP and even the MNS, especially because it does not have a second rung line-up of leaders.
“Almost all of Uddhav’s confidantes and strategists are either from the Rajya Sabha or the state legislative council and have not been elected from the masses,” said the source.
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