Bharatiya Janata Party leaders on Wednesday sought a first information report against Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray for derogatory remarks against his Uttar Pradesh counterpart Adityanath, the Hindustan Times reported.
BJP leader Sunil Raghunath Kedar filed a complaint in Nashik based on a 2018 video, in which Thackeray had criticised Adityanath for garlanding a photo of Shivaji Maharaj while wearing chappals.
“I felt like taking the same chappals and hitting his face with it,” Thackeray had reportedly said, according to the Hindustan Times. “Had he [Adityanath] been a yogi [spiritual leader], he would have given up everything and gone and sat in a cave. But he has gone and sat in the chief minister’s chair.”
Yavatmal District President Nitin Bhutada also filed a complaint against Thackeray at the Umerkhed police station, reported NDTV.
The saffron party’s demand for a FIR came after Union minister Narayan Rane was arrested on Tuesday for his remarks on Thackeray. He had said that he would have slapped Thackeray for forgetting the year of India’s Independence during the chief minister’s speech on August 15.
Rane’s arrest triggered clashes among the Shiv Sena and BJP workers.
In Nashik, members of the Shiv Sena pelted stones at the BJP’s office. Other Shiv Sena loyalists marched to Rane’s home in Mumbai, where they clashed with BJP workers and the police.
Some of the protestors in Pune also threw slippers at Rane’s posters.
The Union minister, who was arrested on Tuesday, was released on bail hours later. On the same day, Rane filed a petition in the Bombay High Court to quash the FIRs against him.
The state government on Wednesday told the Bombay High Court that no coercive steps would be taken against Rane till September 17.
Call for FIR against CM’s wife Rashmi Thackeray
A BJP leader from Nashik on Wednesday also filed a complaint against Uddhav Thackeray’s wife, Rashmi Thackeray, who is the editor of Shiv Sena’s mouthpiece Saamana, the Hindustan Times reported.
Complainant Shivaji Barke demanded that an editorial published on Wednesday had “insulted the constitutional post” that Rane holds as a Union minister.
Following Rane’s “imminent arrest”, the editorial had said that the minister’s “days in the Union cabinet were numbered”, PTI reported.
“Since Rane is not a normal person, he undermines the pride and prestige of Maharashtra. The BJP should at least understand now.”
The Saamana editorial had also pointed out that the country’s laws were equal for everyone, and that the BJP should not ask if the rule of law prevails in the state.
The BJP also demanded action against Yuva Sena President Varun Sardesai under the Indian Penal Code Section 153(A), which provides for punishment for promoting enmity between different groups.
Complainant Rishikesh Jayant Aher from Nashik said that Sardesai had held an “illegal demonstration” outside Rane’s residence on Wednesday. They claimed that Thackeray had felicitated the Yuva Sena chief later at the chief minister’s residence.
Meanwhile, the Nationalist Congress Party, the Shiv Sena’s ally in Maharashtra, alleged that the BJP was threatening leaders of the Maha Vikas Aghadi government, PTI reported. Party spokesperson Nawab Malik said that although the BJP can misuse the power of the central government, no leader from Maharashtra feared the party’s “shallow threats.”
“It [BJP] is free to file complaints in false cases and send our leaders to jail by misusing power,” he said. “There is nothing new in it on part of the BJP.”
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