BJP looks to mend fence with Sena

Amidst bickering ahead of Lok Sabha polls, the BJP on Tuesday seemed to extend an olive branch to the Shiv Sena by sanctioning Rs 100 crore for the much-awaited memorial to honour late Bal Thackeray, the architect of the saffron alliance.

The decision to sanction Rs 100 crore for the memorial project was taken on Tuesday at the weekly Cabinet meeting presided over by Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis.

The development comes on the eve of the 93rd birth anniversary of Thackeray. The memorial will come up at the Mayor' bungalow and compound at Shivaji Park-Dadar in central Mumbai.

On Wednesday, papers related to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation owned Mayor's bungalow-compound would be transferred to Balasaheb Thackeray National Memorial Public Trust.

On the occasion, Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray will also perform Ganesh puja. A formal grand bhoomi pujan is also expected in the next few weeks in which prime minister Narendra Modi would be invited.

The Rs 100 crore fund for the memorial will come from the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), which functions directly under the control of the chief minister.

There are also reports that a special screening of Thackeray, the biopic on the late Shiv Sena supremo, would be held for Modi. "Relations of BJP and Shiv Sena will remain sweet," finance and planning minister Sudhir Mungantiwar of the BJP told reporters after the Cabinet meeting.

He further said that BJP has always favoured an alliance with the Shiv Sena and there are chances of a pre-poll tie-up. Over the years, though Sena and BJP are old allies, there has been a war of words. Thackeray and his aides had been attacking Modi, BJP president Amit Shah and Fadnavis.

The Sena had last year announced that it would go alone in the 2019 Lok Sabha and Maharashtra Legislative Assembly polls. However, BJP is hoping that the polls would be fought together.