New Delhi: Uddhav Thackeray’s political journey from a professional advertising photographer to the chief minister of Maharashtra is not just his story alone. It is rather a tale of the Thackeray family, his father Balasaheb Thackeray’s political legacy in Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena’s exponential rise as a Hindutva party and then the distinct secular tilt it has shown in the past few years.
A new book by journalist Radheshyam Jadhav, titled ‘Trail of the Tiger’, traces Uddhav’s journey in politics through a journalistic analysis of media content.
The book, published by Bloomsbury, will be released on 10 February on ‘SoftCover’, ThePrint’s e-venue to launch select non-fiction books.
In his book, Jadhav analyses various news features, interviews and the Shiv Sena mouthpiece Saamana to bring forth an authentic account of the Shiv Sena’s “saffron to secular” trajectory under the leadership of Uddhav Thackeray.
The book also talks about one of the biggest upheavals in Indian politics where breaking a 30-year-old alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Shiv Sena joined Sonia Gandhi’s camp while holding Sharad Pawar’s finger.
It maps the trail of Hindutva politics in the country, providing readers an insight into the fissures within Hindutva politics, Uddhav’s role in re-framing it and how Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rise altered the Hindutva narrative irrevocably.
Jadhav, an award-winning journalist and communication researcher, has more than 20 years of experience in field reporting.
He holds a PhD in journalism and communication science and has been a British Chevening Gurukul fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
A two-time winner of the prestigious Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award, he has also been an Asia Journalism Fellow at the Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
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