Uddhav slams bjp’s ‘double standards’ on hindutva savarkar issue

Uddhav slams bjp’s ‘double standards’ on hindutva savarkar issue

Days after newly named Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar was hit by clashes, MVA holds rally to project united front; BJP merely wants to stoke communal tensions ahead of elections: Sena (UBT) chief

Attempting to project a united front under former Maharashtra CM and Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Uddhav Thackeray, the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), at its joint rally in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar (formerly Aurangabad) on Sunday launched a broadside against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Eknath Shinde government in the State.

While gingerly skirting over thorny alliance issues like Mr. Thackeray’s recent criticism of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over the latter’s remarks against Hindutva ideologue V.D. Savarkar and the renaming of Aurangabad to Sambhajinagar, Mr. Thackeray and the MVA leadership, including Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)’s Ajit Pawar and Congressman Ashok Chavan instead attacked the BJP and PM Modi for their ‘double standards’ and targeting Opposition leaders throughout the country.

Eye on elections

This was the first in a projected series of joint MVA rallies to take place in the State with an eye on the civic body, Lok Sabha and Assembly elections.

Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) chief Nana Patole was absent from the rally.

Mr. Thackeray, who led the MVA charge, attacked the BJP and the Shinde faction over the meaning of ‘Hindutva’, the Savarkar issue and the BJP’s discrimination against the Muslim community.

There had been frictions between Mr. Thackeray and his Congress allies over the renaming issue when he was CM. However, all MVA leaders were careful in Sunday’s rally to refer to erstwhile ‘Aurangabad’ as ‘Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar’.

‘Veer Savarkar did not suffer 14 years in the Andamans for Modi to come to power. We [MVA] are determined to preserve the Constitution. The BJP merely wants to divert attention from real issues and hence are persecuting Rahul Gandhi,’ he said.

The Sena (UBT) chief alleged that the BJP did not want to do anything but merely stoke communal tensions ahead of elections.

‘Use and throw’ policy

Stating that his former political adversaries — the Congress and the NCP — had stood by him in his hour of crisis, Mr. Thackeray said that the BJP only believed in the ‘use and throw’ principle.

Mr. Pawar said that if the BJP indeed respected Savarkar as it claimed, then why had it not yet announced the Bharat Ratna for him.