Eknath Shinde wishes former boss Uddhav Thackeray on his birthday, avoids mention as Shiv Sena president

Mumbai: Staging an intra-party rebellion, toppling the state government and a hostile takeover are facts that could be entirely glossed over when it is your predecessor’s birthday. Accordingly, greetings went out to the former chief minister, Uddhav Thackeray, from his successor, Eknath Shinde, on Wednesday. Shinde took pains to only refer to his former boss as the former CM and not as the Shiv Sena president.

Shinde tweeted, “Happy Birthday to Hon’ble Shri Uddhavji Thackeray, Former Chief Minister of Maharashtra. May he have a long and healthy life, I pray to Goddess Jagdamba.”

He pointedly avoided addressing Thackeray as the party president, given that he was the architect of the rebellion in the Shiv Sena and his faction and the Thackeray-led one are currently engaged in a legal and legislative battle over the control of the party and its poll symbol, the bow and arrow. The Thackeray faction has moved the Supreme Court, seeking direction to stay the Election Commission of India’s proceedings on the Eknath Shinde group’s plea for his group to be recognised as the ‘real’ Shiv Sena. The Thackeray-led group’s move came after proceedings were initiated by the ECI on a plea by the Shinde camp to be recognised as the ‘real’ Shiv Sena and also staked claim to the bow-and-arrow symbol.

Shinde has claimed that he represents the real Shiv Sena while Thackeray has slammed him for using party supremo Bal Thackeray’s photo and challenged him and the other rebel legislators to seek votes in the name of their parents, ‘if they have the intestinal fortitude to do so’.

Shinde avoided referring to Thackeray as the Shiv Sena president, while Thackeray, in a two-part interview to the party mouthpiece, Saamna, slammed him for staging a rebellion when he was recuperating from two major surgeries. Further, Thackeray also lashed out at the rebel legislators and claimed that they were like the rotten leaves of a tree and were fit to be shed. It would be good for the tree as there would be new leaves, he said in the interview.

However, Shinde hit back at Thackeray. “Let them say whatever they want to say. He has termed us rotten leaves but I want to tell him that those rotten leaves have created history. This is known to the public. People have seen who has made history,” he said.

In a related development, the newly appointed Shiv Sena leader in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Shewale, has claimed that the advertisements released by several leaders now in the Shinde camp, for Thackeray’s birthday on Wednesday, had been rejected by Saamna.

Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis also wished Thackeray, greeting him as the former CM. “Happy Birthday to Former Chief Minister Shri Uddhavji Thackeray! I wish him a healthy life and long life!” Fadnavis tweeted.