From Matoshree to plush hotels: Times they are a-changing
Thackeray resident 'Matoshree' was once considered as the power centre of all the political developments in Maharashtra. Be it during the political crises or any other time, the upscale bungalow in Bandra (East) Kalanagar served as the key venue of major political meetings.
Once upon a time, in the era of Shiv Sena patriarch Bal Thackeray, heavyweight politicians including LK Advani, Sharad Pawar and Sushma Swaraj had shown up at the Thackeray doorstep for talks with the party chief. Former President Pranab Mukherjee had visited Matoshree to seek the Thackerays' support for the presidential election. Moreover, when Uddhav took over the reins as the party chief, he had made it clear to the BJP alliance leaders that they should come to Matoshree to have an edge in the talks. There was a time when Nitin Gadkari disliked going to Matoshree and Uddhav declined meeting him, saying he preferred someone more senior.
In recent days, the picture has changed. Sena supremo Uddhav Thackeray has been seen going in and out of his official residence Matoshree and holding meetings at plush hotels with leaders of the new-founded Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) alliance, once considered as the Sena archrival. It was the first time in the political history that significant political meetings had taken place outside Matoshree.
What’s more noticeable is that it never happened in 30 years of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Shiv Sena alliance. Ahead of the 2019 May Lok Sabha election, BJP president Amit Shah had visited Uddhav at Matoshree.
Uddhav has been meeting leaders of both Congress NCP at the venues, pre-decided by the leaders of the two parties.
Earlier on Monday, Uddhav's meeting with NCP chief Sharad Pawar took place at Taj hotel, Bandra a 20-minute drive from Matoshree. "Pawar insisted on meeting Uddhav at a neutral venue instead of Matoshree. Similar thing recurred on Wednesday when senior Congress leaders met Uddhav at Trident hotel Bandra, where they held an hourlong meeting, again on a neutral place," said a leader close to the Sena.
Late on Thursday evening, Sena leaders who once used to take pride in doing everything openly in daylight, held a secret meeting with leaders of Congress-NCP at the conference room of a Bandra educational institute.
Reportedly, Uddhav also met Congress leader Ahmed Patel, known as the voice of Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi at a city hotel on Tuesday night. However, Sena spokesperson Sanjay Raut later dismissed the reports.
Probably it is the first time in the Sena's history that the leaders from a different political party is calling the shots.
After the BJP denied its will to form the government without the Sena, which many considered as a political masterstroke, has left Sena in a catch-22.
Uddhav is now hell-bent on winning over the trust and support of opposition leaders, whom his father was once hell-bent on opposing.
It is also revealed that to form a coalition, Uddhav is ready to shed the Hindutva ideology, one of the Sena's founding principles.
However, the Sena has also changed its working style. The party, which believed in the "Remote Control" system of power, for the first time had fielded a Thackeray scion in Aaditya, who successfully contested the state assembly election from the Worli constituency.