‘Uddhav Thackeray needs to be taught a lesson’: Amit Shah

In a party leaders meeting in Mumbai, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said that Shiv Sena’s leader Uddhav Thackeray needed to be taught a lesson.

According to an NDTV report, Shah had blamed the former chief minister of Maharashtra for his party’s breakup and the subsequent events. Shah dismissed claims that the BJP was involved in Eknath Shinde’s uprising and the subsequent overthrow of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) administration led by Thackeray.

Shah claimed that his (Uddhav Thackeray) “greed” was the reason why a member of his party had turned against him.

“We can tolerate everything in politics but we cannot tolerate betrayal,” said Amit Shah.

“Uddhav had not only betrayed the BJP but also betrayed the ideology, and insulted the people of Maharashtra. Under the guidance of Narendra Modi, the target of the BJP and the real Shiv Sena alliance should be to win 150 seats in the BMC elections. The public is with the BJP led by Modi. Not with Uddhav Thackeray’s party which betrays ideology,” he added.

BJP and Shiv Sena

In order to compete for seats in the Maharashtra Assembly and the Lok Sabha, Shiv Sena formed a partnership with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Between 1995 through 1999, the two created a government in Maharashtra. From 1999 to 2014, the Sena and the BJP jointly held the position of opposition parties in the state.

Since the coalition fell down in 2014 over seat distribution in the lead-up to the assembly elections, the Sena and the BJP had had an unrelated relationship, but they reconciled after the state issued a split verdict.

In order to create the Maha Vikas Aghadi administration following the 2019 assembly elections, the Sena again broke with the BJP and joined forces with Sharad Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party and the Congress.

The BJP was allegedly flourishing in Maharashtra at the expense of the Sena at the time, according to Thackeray, who also accused them of betrayal.