As BJP accuses Shiv Sena of 'mafia raj' in the BMC, the Thackerays hit back and accuse BJP of sheltering corruption within its own folds
Like father, like son. A day after his father announced that the Shiv Sena would go solo if the BJP doesn’t agree to their demands, the Sena’s youth wing leader Aaditya Thackeray took a potshot at the BJP’s anti-corruption campaign. In a tweet, the junior Thackeray alleged that the very road contractors who were blacklisted by the BMC were now being given work by the BJP government in Nagpur.
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Sore point
The BJP has made corruption in BMC a poll plank and has alleged that the Sena's reign in the civic body is nothing but mafia raj. Sena led the BMC for over two decades. Interestingly, the BJP has been a ruling partner all along. BJP MP Kirit Somaiya had levelled the allegation against Sena and faced the wrath of the sainiks when he tried to burn an effigy of this ‘mafia’ on Dussehra. The MP and his supporters were assaulted and later arrested.
A social media campaign has also been launched, blaming the Thackerays for the city’s worsening state of affairs. Memes are being circulated with pictures of Uddhav and the city’s depleting infrastructure.
On Friday, a news channel reported that one of the road contractors that had been blacklisted in Mumbai and is now facing trial, has got a contract in Nagpur. The Nagpur civic corporation is controlled by the BJP and the city is also the hometown of CM Devendra Fadnavis, who took initiative in launching an inquiry against tainted contractors in Mumbai. Referring to this report, Aaditya tweeted: “Mumbai mein mafia, Nagpur mein Maaf-kiya” (What is mafia in Mumbai is forgiven in Nagpur).
Multiple hits
In a party meeting yesterday, Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray also made a caustic remark on the BJP’s trend of admitting people with a criminal background in its fold. "Why should we join hands with a party that shelters criminals?" he said, while telling the sainiks to prepare to fight the BJP in the civic polls.
The day before that, city mayor Snehal Ambekar targeted CM Fadnavis, criticising him for being photographed with an alleged goon from Pune. After the picture went viral on social media, the state government said the person had accompanied his relative to the CM and there was no way the CMO could have verified his credentials.
She mentioned the photo in a letter to BMC chief Ajoy Mehta, asking him to tell the truth about allegations of mafia raj and dalal (middlemen) raj in the BMC.
Ambekar’s letter is seen as an attempt to show that the BJP is not averse to goons and was merely being hypocritical by heaping allegations against the Sena.
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