Author: TN Raghunatha/ Mumbai
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: August 28, 2004
Although they came in heaps subsequently,
the first slap was symbolic, one which Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar
Aiyar is unlikely to forget in a haste. As for his party, the Congress,
and its alliance partner, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), both will
have to live with the echoes of that slap in the run-up to the Maharashtra
Assembly polls.
A belligerent Shiv Sena chief Bal
Thackeray hit the first slipper on Mr Aiyar's wax effigy to launch a novel
Jode Mara (slap with slipper) agitation against the minister for his act
of removing a plaque carrying quotes of Veer Savarkar at the Cellular Jail
in Port Blair. Hundreds of sainiks followed suit.
The Shiv Sena on Friday offered
a foretaste of its aggressive strategy for the October 13, 2004, Assembly
polls as Mr Thackeray - not usually known to participate in public protestations
- stepped out of his Matoshtri residence to unleash a fierce campaign against
Mr Aiyar and the Congress-NCP led ruling alliance on the Savarkar issue.
The Sena had especially chosen a spot adjacent to an under-construction
Savarkar memorial at the historic Shivaji Park in north- central Mumbai
to kick off the Jode Mara agitation. On Friday, the Sena, whose activists
had for several days been burning effigies of Mr Aiyar and carrying out
other forms of agitation on the Savarkar issue in different parts of the
state, amply demonstrated that it wanted to exploit the issue to the hilt
in the Assembly polls.
Hours before the arrival of Mr Thackeray
at the venue of the agitation, sainiks piled up a huge heap of old slippers,
especially procured for the occasion.
After a brief speech in which he
gave a tongue-lashing to Mr Aiyar, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and
UPA ministers from Maharashtra, Mr Thackeray slapped the effigy of the
Union Petroleum Minister with a footwear. Then followed a footwear-slapping
spree in which senior Sena leaders, including former Lok Sabha Speaker
Manohar Joshi and the party's national executive president Uddhav Thackeray,
also participated. Incidentally, the late Savarkar's son, Vishwas Savarkar,
was also present on the occasion.
Mr Thackeray - who made no bones
about his anger at the manner in which Mr Aiyar had "insulted" Savarkar
and the way the UPA Government had refused to concede the Opposition's
demand for re-installation of the plaque carrying quotations of the "revered"
leader at the Port Blair jail - said Mr Aiyar might be in New Delhi but
he would definitely be smarting from symbolic slaps in the days to come,
by which time the agitation would have spread to other parts of the State.
The Sena chief charged that Mr Aiyar
had once conducted himself like a stooge of China. "He had collected funds
for the Chinese during the India-Chinese war while studying in Cambridge,"
Mr Thackeray said. He also took a dig at Ms Gandhi who, he said, being
Italian-born was not expected to know much about the late Savarkar's contribution
to the freedom movement.
The fiery Sena chief came down heavily
on Maharashtra ministers, including Sharad Pawar and Shivraj Patil, in
the UPA Government for not speaking up for the late Savarkar, despite having
known that the latter was still revered by the people in the state. The
Savarkar issue has given fresh election ammunition to the Shiv Sena, which
had so far been targeting the ruling Congress-NCP for "non- development"
in the State, playing on the anti-incumbency sentiment. The Opposition
had been raising issues like the handling of drought, farmers' suicides
and malnutrition deaths in impoverished areas. Savarkar, however, is an
issue that has emotive appeal here.
"An election cannot be fought on
a single issue alone. Anti-incumbency is naturally against them (the Congress-NCP).
We have started the campaign against a Union Minister for insulting a freedom
fighter. The BJP has a Tricolour campaign. All three are election issues;
any one cannot be the issue," said Sena Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Nirupam.
The Sena is accusing state Congress
leaders of being mute spectators to their party colleague insulting a revered
freedom fighter from the State, highlighting internal contradictions in
the Congress over the issue. "While the UPA Government refuses to re-instate
the plaque carrying Savarkar's quotes, Congress leaders here are asking
Mr Aiyar to apologise," Mr Nirupam pointed out. On Friday, former Congress
state president Ramrao Adik said the insult to Savarkar was unacceptable
and demanded Mr Aiyar tender an apology for his remarks. Former CM Vilasrao
Deshmukh, too, dissociated his party from Mr Aiyar's statement, saying
those were his (Mr Aiyar's) "personal views".