Mumbai: Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray turned 60 Monday and his deputy Ajit Pawar was among the first to wish him. The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader wished the Shiv Sena chief at the stroke of midnight, but the birthday niceties were delivered in an attractive gift-wrapping paper with a very suggestive message packed inside.
Along with his wishes, Pawar had tweeted a photo of him and the CM sitting in an open-top car flanked by a few other politicians, actor Aamir Khan and security personnel. What made the tweet suggestive was the fact that Pawar was behind the steering wheel of the car while Thackeray was in the passenger seat.
The tweet came hours after Saamana, the Shiv Sena mouthpiece, published an interview with Thackeray in which he equated the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government — comprising the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress — to a three-wheeled rickshaw, with him in the driver’s seat.
“The future of my government is not in the hands of the opposition … a three-wheeler is a vehicle of the poor,” Thackeray said in the two-part interview. “The steering wheel is in my hands. The other two are sitting behind.”
Pawar in his tweet said, “Best wishes to the Hon. CM of Maharashtra, ShivSena Party President & Maha Vikas Aghadi Leader, Shri. Uddhav Thackeray ji. Wish you a healthy & long life!”
Best wishes to the Hon. CM of Maharashtra, ShivSena Party President & Maha Vikas Aghadi Leader, Shri. Uddhav Thackeray ji. Wish you a healthy & long life! @OfficeofUT @CMOMaharashtra pic.twitter.com/PlrNgNg508
— Ajit Pawar (@AjitPawarSpeaks) July 26, 2020
Leaders from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who have been watching the bickering between the MVA allies from a distance, were quick to catch on to Pawar’s veiled message.
We are deeply grateful to our readers & viewers for their time, trust and subscriptions.
Quality journalism is expensive and needs readers to pay for it. Your support will define our work and ThePrint’s future.
BJP leader Ram Kadam retweeted Pawar’s tweet, saying, “Exactly in whose hands is the steering wheel of the state?”
Sparring between allies
The sparring between Uddhav Thackeray and Ajit Pawar comes at a time when there have been instances of power tussles and bickering within the MVA government. Congress and NCP leaders have grumbled about CM Thackeray taking unilateral decisions with the help of the bureaucracy and not giving them their due.
Earlier, NCP chief Sharad Pawar had also said CM Thackeray runs the government like he runs the Shiv Sena and he needs to have more dialogue with his allies.
Thackeray and Ajit Pawar too have had some ego tussles. Earlier this month, NCP poached five Shiv Sena councillors from the Parner municipal council in Maharashtra’s Ahmednagar district. These councillors were inducted in the NCP at Baramati in Ajit Pawar’s presence.
The Shiv Sena chief did not take well to this. Thackeray and his deputy held a meeting over the issue at the location of the proposed Bal Thackeray memorial in Dadar’s Shivaji Park, following which the five councillors returned to the Shiv Sena fold.
Subscribe to our channels on YouTube & Telegram
News media is in a crisis & only you can fix it
You are reading this because you value good, intelligent and objective journalism. We thank you for your time and your trust.
You also know that the news media is facing an unprecedented crisis. It is likely that you are also hearing of the brutal layoffs and pay-cuts hitting the industry. There are many reasons why the media’s economics is broken. But a big one is that good people are not yet paying enough for good journalism.
We have a newsroom filled with talented young reporters. We also have the country’s most robust editing and fact-checking team, finest news photographers and video professionals. We are building India’s most ambitious and energetic news platform. And we aren’t even three yet.
At ThePrint, we invest in quality journalists. We pay them fairly and on time even in this difficult period. As you may have noticed, we do not flinch from spending whatever it takes to make sure our reporters reach where the story is. Our stellar coronavirus coverage is a good example. You can check some of it here.
This comes with a sizable cost. For us to continue bringing quality journalism, we need readers like you to pay for it. Because the advertising market is broken too.
If you think we deserve your support, do join us in this endeavour to strengthen fair, free, courageous, and questioning journalism, please click on the link below. Your support will define our journalism, and ThePrint’s future. It will take just a few seconds of your time.