JOIN US“During his speech here, Rahul Gandhi repeatedly called Mumbai as Bombay. Those who want to break Mumbai away from Maharashtra call Mumbai as Bombay,” Thackeray said in an editorial in party mouthpiece “Saamna.”
The 39-year-old Rahul’s Mumbai visit was like the “funeral procession of Congress” taken out by Marathi people, Thackeray commented, ridiculing the massive police protection deployed by the Maharashtra government for the “Congress Yuvraj.”
Thackeray also blasted the state’s minister of state for home Ramesh Bagwe, who was seen carrying Rahul’s shoes, apparently for safe-keeping, during the Congress leader’s visit here. “The minister should be ashamed to stoop so low,” the Sena chief said, telling him that “Rahul Gandhi is not Mahatma Gandhi so that his shoes should be held close to the heart.”
The paper also targeted management guru Arundam Chaudhuri, who favoured converting Mumbai into a separate state or union territory, out of Maharashtra. Chaudhuri, Editor-in-Chief of ‘The Sunday Indian’, has said in an editorial in the latest issue of the magazine “Hats off to Shah Rukh Khan for standing his ground! It’s now time to end this hooliganism once and for all and make Mumbai a union territory!”
The Sena mouthpiece quoted Chaudhuri’s words in its frontpage story and said he has “insulted Maharashtra by spewing such venom.” “Saamna” also reported that during a recent TV debate, Chaudhuri deliberately called Mumbai as Bombay. Last year, Chaudhuri’s IIPM roped in Shah Rukh Khan to host its annual quiz.
Social revolution
If all this was not enough, the Republican Party of India leader Ramdas Athawale also jumped into the controversy and asked Rahul Gandhi to marry a Dalit girl and bring in a social revolution.
“The casteism and social disharmony will not go away just by visiting Dalit colonies or shaking hands with Dalit people... Rahul should marry a Dalit girl to bring in a true social revolution. I shall ask Sonia Gandhi to select a Dalit girl for Rahul,” Athawale said at his party’s convention.