Foes turn friends? Mamata remembers birth anniversary of Balasaheb Thackeray

Politics makes bizarre alliances possible. Parties and leaders who are polar opposites in ideology and policies often rally together when it suits them. We have seen erstwhile ‘secular’ young leaders suddenly hopping temples. The son of a roman catholic becomes ‘Janeu Dhari’. Leaders who are so secular that they even object to the rainbow being called ‘Ramdhanu’ in local tongue and change it to ‘Rongdhanu’ start befriending parties whose core ideology differs so starkly from their own.

Mamata Banerjee seems to have found new friends. This time it is Shiv Sena’s Uddhav Thackeray. Shiv Sena, whose founder Balasaheb Thackeray shaped it around core Hindu ideologies, is looking for new friends too. Her protest march outside the Rashtrapati Bhavan against demonetisation in 2016 saw Shiv Sena leaders walking with her. She has been meeting Uddhav Thackrey on several occasions since.

Today, her newfound love for the Right-wing party saw another dimension altogether when she took to Twitter to wish on the occasion of Balasaheb Thackeray’s birth anniversary.

Her tweet shocked some, whereas some guessed the reason behind it:

https://twitter.com/KanchanGupta/status/955703449882001408?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

https://twitter.com/sankrant/status/955699007765987328?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Her tweet, however, had twitterati in splits. Many replied with sarcastic even hilarious reactions.

https://twitter.com/desaiardeshir/status/955699732793368582?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Twitter users were quick to remind her that Balasaheb was vehemently opposed to the kind of appeasement politics her party practices.

https://twitter.com/viadipankar/status/955637376298217477?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
People soon pointed out that she might become ‘selectively Hindu-loving’like some youth icons too.

https://twitter.com/rohinikulkarni6/status/955709689186021376?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Some reminded her of her past reactions to Shiv Sena:

https://twitter.com/c_aashish/status/955704392853803009?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Twitter users even pointed it out that the current Shiv Sena has become a shadow of its former self under Uddhav Thackrey and it is nothing like Balasaheb has envisioned.

https://twitter.com/pikudollie/status/955721336701173760?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
How far both Uddhav Thackrey and Mamata Banerjee are willing to ‘adjust’ on their respective parties’ core ideology in their quest for an anti-BJP force, remains to be seen.

Sanghamitra: reader, writer, dreamer, no one