Amid the stalemate over Government formation in Maharashtra, a Marathi daily, widely seen inclined towards the RSS, on Monday likened Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut to ‘Betaal’, the mythological ghost known for challenging King Vikramaditya with his witty riddles.
Coming down heavily on Raut, Tarun Bharat, the Nagpur-based publication believed to be close to the Sangh and its political extension BJP, said he was hurting the chances of BJP-Sena alliance to come to power in Maharashtra.
Without naming Raut, it called him a “joker” and said “his attempts to portray a picture that Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis is isolated in the BJP is nothing but pure entertainment”.
Raut, the Sena’s Rajya Sabha member and executive editor of its mouthpiece ‘Saamana’, has been at the forefront of voicing his party’s demands over equal distribution of power and sharing the Chief Minister’s post with the BJP in the next Maharashtra Government.
He mocked the BJP on multiple occasions by asking questions like “Itna sannata kyon hai bhai...” (why is there so much silence), using the popular dialogue from Bollywood blockbuster “Sholay”, on the economic slowdown.
On Monday, Tarun Bharat published an editorial titled ‘Uddhav and Betaal’. The term ‘Betaal’ is also used in Marathi where it means a person indulging in loose talks.
“Late Balasaheb Thackeray spent his entire life for wresting power from the Congress and NCP. But this Betaal is trying hard to shatter his dreams and there will be no disappointment like this to see the Sena dragging behind one loud-mouth,” the Marathi daily said.
Referring to Mahabharat, it said the Sena leader’s first name — Sanjay — was also that of a character from the epic who gave a “live relay” of the war between the Pandavas and Kauravas to blind King Dritharashtra.