Cracks in Sena-BJP widen as Uddhav Thackeray's party tries to undermine CM

Shiv Sena's protest against Pakistani ghazal maestro Ghulam Ali and former Pakistan foreign minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri's engagements in Mumbai has a strong undercurrent of its strained relation with ruling ally BJP.

This exercise in brinkmanship and one-upmanship is meant to undermine the authority of chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, who is the state's home minister, and also send across a strong message to the BJP against trying to corner the Sena further.

Moreover, the Sena, which had dominated the BJP in the two-and-a-half decades that the saffron alliance was in force, finds itself unable to reconcile itself to playing a distant second fiddle to the BJP after the assembly elections.

Though the Sena and BJP patched up after their alliance fell apart before the polls, the former has had to eat humble pie, with party leaders and cadre complaining about them getting the shorter end of the stick in the government. Shiv Sainiks grumble that after prime minister Narendra Modi's rise on the national stage, the party was being systematically cornered.

The tension between the two had seen the Sena stay away from Modi's functions in Mumbai on Sunday, including the bhoomipoojan for the international memorial to Dalit icon Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar and the ground-breaking for two Metro railway lines.

Prakash Akolkar, political editor of Sakal group and the author of Sena's first Marathi biography 'Jai Maharashtra,' noted that "the Sena was being humiliated and cut to size by the BJP as a part of a design since Modi became the PM".

"The Sena is very agitated, irritated and cornered, and doesn't know how to tackle it," said Akolkar, adding that this projection of hyper-nationalism by attacking Pakistan was meant to secure its vote base in the Kalyan-Dombivli civic polls.

"This is a spillover of the strained ties between the Sena and the BJP. Blackening Sudheendra Kulkarni's face was also meant to send a strong message to the BJP. Sena's opposition to Pakistan is normal and such protests have been happening since the 1990s. However, this act is meant to convey to the BJP that the Sena is not willing to be meddled with and cornered beyond a point," said a Sena source.

He added that round one of the proxy war had gone to the Sena when the organisers of Ali's show had been forced to cancel it despite the state government agreeing to provide security, thus helping the Sena thumb its nose at the BJP and Fadnavis.

"This is a game of one-upmanship, but public opinion is with the Sena when it comes to opposing Pakistan," noted a former Sena MP, adding that the BJP had lost some public support since the Lok Sabha and state assembly polls.

The Sena leader also predicted that the alliance would hit choppier weather before the BMC elections in early 2017, which he said the two parties are likely to contest on their own.

"There has to be consistency in Sena's stand on the issue of Pakistan. Kasuri's programme is opposed, while Pakistani cricketer Javed Mianded visiting Matoshree in 2004 (the Thackeray family residence in Bandra East) is hailed," charged a BJP legislator from Mumbai. He added that Sena's sole representative in the Modi-led government Anant Geete had taken oath in Pakistan prime minister Nawaz Sharif's presence.

"If the Sena is in power, it should behave like a ruling party. Even if we increase taxes marginally, it calls it an act akin to pickpocketing. Yet it expects importance from the same government. It is unable to reconcile itself to the fact that it is a distant number two now. If we are cold-shouldering them, we are only taking a leaf out of the Sena's book," he added.