MUMBAI: On Saturday, May 14, Shiv Sena chief and Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray addressed a rally at the city’s Bandra Kurla Complex where thousands of party faithfuls had gathered to hear just one thing: will the saffron party go back to its Hindutva roots, the very ideals that the party had been founded upon, but perceived to have been forcibly pushed to the backburner, thanks to an unlikely alliance with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).
Thackeray did not disappoint.
In his speech, he came down heavily on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over what he termed “fake Hindutva”, one that was “misleading the nation.” Sena’s Hindutva, Thackeray said – backed by a loud advertising campaign across the city – meant having “Lord Ram in their hearts and giving jobs to people.”
In a sense, Thackeray’s hand was forced by the developments over the last six to eight weeks, headlined by his cousin and Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray’s demand that loudspeakers atop mosques be pulled down, combined with his call to chant the Hanuman Chalisa (a devotional hymn by the 16th century poet-saint Tulsidas praising the monkey god Hanuman) outside mosques. BJP’s backing of MNS’ demands meant that the Sena had more than a handful to deal with.
Both BJP and MNS have been accusing Sena of “forgetting” the ideals of Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray ever since it joined hands with NCP and Congress to form the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi alliance. In retaliation, the Sena chief has often labelled BJP’s Hindutva as “divisive” and “duplicate”.
“Nowadays, all parties, including one that has donned a veil of fake Hindutva, which was with us earlier, are misleading the entire nation,” Thackeray said, blaming BJP for using Hindutva ideology for political gains. He added that an illusion was created that the BJP is the only protector and custodian of Hindutva. Thackeray said, “Do they want those who burn houses or the ones who are lighting stoves? Our Hindutva is to light stoves in the homes of people and not burn down homes.”
A close aide of Thackeray pointed out that Sena is attempting a balancing act.
“A significant section of our voter base supports Hindutva,” the aide said. “For the last three decades, Hindutva is part of our agenda. We can’t ever give it up. If we did, it would mean Advantage BJP.”
He added, “Since we are running a government with secular parties, we have had to dilute our hard-line Hindutva stance. It makes more political sense to combine Hindutva with a development agenda.” To be sure, the Shiv Sena, seen earlier as an anti-Muslim party, has been supporting the Muslim community during the loudspeaker row.
Sena’s Hindutva-plus-welfare combination
The same Sena aide said there is widespread resentment over inflation and rising unemployment, and that the BJP is not even acknowledging these concerns. As if to echo this, Shiv Sena MP and chief spokesperson Sanjay Raut said issues such as the Gyanvapi mosque debate will divide the nation, and that the country needed stability after the Ayodhya movement.
As the Gyanvapi mosque verdict was set to be delivered by a court in Uttar Pradesh last week, Sanjay Raut said, “Statements like jhanki-baki (‘Ayodhya toh jhanki hai, Mathura-Kashi baki hai’ or ‘Ayodhya is just a trailer, there’s still Mathura and Kashi left)) by BJP are to break the country. The nation needs stability after the Ram Mandir movement; the temple is being constructed… These issues are for political gains.”
Raut added, “Thousands of lives were lost in the Ayodhya movement, and now the temple is being constructed. The country must instead look at inflation, unemployment and national security. The rupee has depreciated to a record low, the economy has completely collapsed, and citizens are unable to cope with the tearaway inflation. Political leaders must speak on these issues if they want to avoid another Sri Lanka-like situation.”
“The Maha Vikas Aghadi government should speak on its failure to generate employment. They did not reduce the [value added] tax on fuel to provide relief to the people. Instead, it reduced the taxes on [imported] liquor. During the last two and a half years, they have engaged in vasooli (extortion) and has been running a transfers racket,” said Keshav Upadhye, chief spokesperson of the BJP’s Maharashtra unit.
A Sena leader said, “We have spent a large chunk of our time in the opposition. We were part of the BJP government but hardly had a say. Now, we have Uddhavji as the CM and so we want to carry out more work for the welfare of the people. Hindutva will remain at our core, but if we squander the opportunity how do we seek votes again? We have to show the work that we have done along with our core ideologies Hindutva and the welfare of Marathi folk.”
Not surprisingly, Sena leader and state environment and tourism minister Aaditya Thackeray has been touring for not only department-related work, but has also conducted a maha-aarti on Hanuman Jayanti in Mumbai, visited the Tirupati temple in Andhra Pradesh, and visited the Trimbakeshwar temple in Nashik district on May 13. He is scheduled to visit Ayodhya on June 15.
Political analyst Surendra Jondhale opined, however, said the Sena has been consistent in its stand on Hindutva. “There is no confusion over Hindutva, both ideologically and politically,” he said. “Uddhav Thackeray has targeted BJP at almost all public rallies saying their Hindutva is fake. So, he has clearly demarcated the Sena’s and BJP’s Hindutva.” Analysts added that by speaking against the confrontational idea of Hindutva, the Sena may have scored over BJP. However, as one of the parties in government, it needs some big projects and key decisions to prove their mettle.
Hemant Desai, another political analyst, said there was a fundamental difference between the Sena and BJP’s definition of Hindutva. Sena was not an ideology-driven party, he said, “and Hindutva remains a political tool for the party.”
Desai said, “Shiv Sena has always maintained that its Hindutva is not upper class, while BJP’s comes from the RSS, which is Brahminical in nature. The Sena never had an ideology, it was a party driven by opponents’ actions. It always needed a nemesis to come together.”
Desai feels that Sena’s first tryst with Hindutva was during the Ram Janmabhoomi temple movement in the early 1990s. “When some BJP leaders refused to take ownership of the Babri Masjid demolition, Balasaheb saw an opportunity and said if Shiv Sainiks did it, then he was proud of them. Over the years, the party’s Hindu voter base grew and Sena played along with the BJP. However, with the change in leadership, the party has softened on Muslims, north Indians, and south Indian communities. Overall, the Sena’s Hindutva has become soft,” he said.
Prakash Akolkar, a senior journalist and a Sena observer said that the part walked on the agenda set by the BJP. “In the first session of the state legislature, Uddhav confessed that mixing religion and politics was not right, but now he is playing the game that BJP had set for him. Hanuman Chalisa, loudspeakers, who will go to Ayodhya first are non-issues. People are not concerned with hard-line or soft Hindutva. Inflation is at an eight-year high and he (Thackeray) should speak on such issues. Instead of Hindutva, he should take up development agenda,” Akolkar said.
When asked about Sena’s new Hindutva stance, BJP spokesperson Upadhye said, “For BJP, Hindutva and development are key agendas, and they go together. Shiv Sena had Hindutva agenda at its core, but it gave it up for the sake of power.”
Has Uddhav Thackeray walked out of his father’s shadow?
Political analysts feel that the seeds of separation were sown not after the 2019 elections, but in 2014 itself when BJP took on the role of the senior partner in the saffron alliance government (they won 122 and 63 seats respectively in the 288-seat legislative assembly). It was then, Sena insiders point out, that Uddhav Thackeray saw BJP’s changing attitude.
In his recent speech, Thackeray said he was “not naive like Bal Thackeray who allowed the BJP to trick him under the pretext of Hindutva.”
This was a bold statement, given the reverence his party members have for his father. A senior Sena leader said, “Uddhavji has been observing BJP-Sena relations from the time he was in his 20s. He saw a change in the BJP post-2014. However, he did not allow BJP to finish off the Sena as it did to some regional parties [in other states]. People have questioned his political acumen but he held his ground and waited for the right opportunity to snap ties after they failed to honour their word.”
That “word” was the Sena’s claim that BJP promised the party that it will share the chief minister’s post for two-and-a-half years each. BJP denied this. Feeling both slighted and betrayed, Thackeray forged an alliance with the Congress and NCP, forming the MVA government. In 2019, the BJP had won 105 seats, while the Sena won 56. When BJP refused to share the chief minister’s post, the Sena saw an opportunity for an unlikely alliance with Congress (44 seats) and NCP (54 seats). Together, they would have had 169 seats, including eight independents and eight legislators from other parties who had promised support.
According to Arvind Sawant, former Union minister and Sena chief spokesperson, Thackeray’s decision to snap ties with BJP marked a new path for the party. “The BJP does not hold a copyright on Hindutva. In fact, Balasaheb gave Hindutva to BJP which they used only for political gains.”
“The ideals of Balasaheb [Thackeray] and the ideology of Hindutva were set aside by the Shiv Sena just for the chief minister’s post. The people of the country know how staunch BJP’s Hindutva is. BJP had never compromised Hindutva for power,” Upadhye said.
Jondhale added that Thackeray joined the BJP in late 2014 out of political compulsion. “The move to snap ties and go with NCP and Congress also has to do with securing the political career of Aaditya Thackeray,” he opined.
