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Asked about his bonhomie with BJP leaders, Mr Thackeray explained that politics was different from personal relationships.
Asked about his bonhomie with BJP leaders, Mr Thackeray explained that politics was different from personal relationships.
Continuing to maintain an ambivalent stance on a possible alliance between the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), MNS leader Raj Thackeray said on September 19, 2022 that reports that the two parties would meet officially came only from the press and nowhere else.
“I heard about the rapprochement between the BJP and the MNS only from the media,” said Thackeray, who is currently on a five-day tour of the Vidarbha region to rebuild his party’s moribund organization there. .
Mr Thackeray, who had held a meeting of his leaders the day before, told his supporters that if anyone who wanted to make it big in a particular region had to fight with ‘established parties’ there. The BJP is the dominant party in Nagpur while the saffron party as well as the opposition Congress have strongholds in the Vidarbha region, where the MNS is practically absent.
Given his current closeness to the BJP and its top leaders, Mr Thackeray’s intention to challenge ‘established parties’ has posed a question mark over whether the MNS leader will go it alone in future polls civics or will tacitly ally with the saffron party.
Clarifying his remarks made to his supporters during the closed meeting on September 18, 2022, Mr Thackeray, speaking to reporters on September 19, 2022, said: “Previously, Congress was the established party in Vidarbha. Then the BJP fought them to become the dominant party. So if they (the BJP) are the established party in Vidarbha today, then they will have to be fought for a place.
Despite this, Mr Thackeray met with BJP state chairman Chandrashekhar Bawankule and reportedly conferred with the latter for almost an hour and a half. The head of the MNS had met Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Sunday and praised his work.
Asked about his bonhomie with BJP leaders, Mr Thackeray explained that politics was different from personal relationships.
Meanwhile, the MNS leader criticized the sudden twists in Maharashtra politics, hitting both the BJP and the Shiv Sena, the NCP and the Congress.
As he took mockery at Devendra Fadnavis’ early morning swearing-in ceremony with NCP’s Ajit Pawar in 2019, he reserved his harshest censure for his distant cousin – Sena chairman Uddhav Thackeray.
Stating that there is no power-sharing formula between Sena and BJP as asserted by Uddhav Thackeray, Mr. Raj Thackeray said the former should have raised objections about it to the Prime Minister Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah during the election. Maharashtra Assembly poll campaign of 2019 itself.
“Why didn’t you [Uddhav Thackeray] ask Mr. Modi and Mr. Shah as they made it clear that Devendra Fadnavis would be the next CM of Maharashtra. Later, after the elections [2019 Assembly poll]you suddenly form an alliance with the NCP and Congress and insult the mandate of the people,” the MNS leader said.
Wondering why the Vedanta-Foxconn deal left Maharashtra, Mr Thackeray demanded that a full investigation into the matter be launched by the current government.
“It seems Maharashtra is not paying attention to industries. I think we have become complacent given that investments have naturally flowed into the state for so long… It is important to know where we have slipped [alluding to Foxconn issue],” he said.
In a bid to overhaul the party organization, Mr. Thackeray dissolved all senior posts in the MNS in Nagpur while declaring that a new working committee would soon be formed in which the youths would have a chance.