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Fadnavis slams Rahul Gandhi, says BJP will bury ideology that insults Savarkar
Mumbai: Deputy chief minister and senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Devendra Fadnavis hit out at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his remarks on freedom fighter V D Savarkar
Mumbai: Deputy chief minister and senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Devendra Fadnavis hit out at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his remarks on freedom fighter V D Savarkar. He also slammed Uddhav Thackeray-led Sena for supporting Gandhi.
Terming the remarks made by Gandhi shameless, Fadnavis said they will bury the ideology that insults Savarkar. He also said that the ideological legacy of the Sena founder, Bal Thackeray, was being taken forward by chief minister Eknath Shinde and his faction.
Addressing a meeting of Shinde faction MLAs at Veer Savarkar Auditorium in Mumbai, Fadnavis alleged that the Congress was spreading distorted history about Savarkar, but the people of Maharashtra will teach them a lesson. “Rahul Gandhi says Savarkar spent only 3-4 years in jail. He does not know anything about Savarkar. Did any Congress leader was imprisoned like him for such a long period of 11 years? Savarkar was troubled by the British before independence by way of imprisonment and after his death by the Congress which has been trying to imprison his ideology,” he remarked.
Speaking during his Bharat Jodo Yatra at Washim on Tuesday, Gandhi had compared tribal freedom fighter Birsa Munda and Savarkar and said that Munda refused to take money and land offered by the British and attained martyrdom for the rights of tribals, whereas Savarkar used to write mercy petitions to come out of cellular jail and take pension from them.
Fadnavis said that Shiv Sena-led by Uddhav Thackary has no right to take Bal Thackeray’s name. “Balasaheb Thackeray took Savarkar’s Hindutva ideology forward all his life. He attacked the people demeaning Savarkar by his speech and action. Unfortunately, party leaders from his family, who claim a blood relation with him, participated in Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra and endorsed his remarks against Savarkar. Aaditya Thackeray participated in the Yatra alongside Gandhi. The question here is what would Balasaheb be thinking in heaven,” he questioned.
He said that the Thackeray family has lost its right to do politics in Balasaheb’s name. “They have the legacy of the blood relation, but the real ideology is being taken forward by CM Eknath Shinde and his Balasahebanchi Shiv Sena. We abandoned Thackeray’s Sena because they abandoned Savarkar’s ideology,” he said.
Rahul Sehwale, MP from Balasahebanchi Shiv Sena, demanded that the government should not allow the Bharat Jodo Yatra to go further in Maharashtra.
