Giving a new dimension to the ongoing debate over clamour for reservations in education and jobs to Maratha community members, Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray on Tuesday night said that his party was in favour of the State Government giving reservations to people on economic grounds rather than on the basis of caste or religion.
Addressing a mammoth Dussehra rally at the historic Shivaji Park, Uddhav dared his party’s senior alliance partner in the State, BJP to contest the forthcoming Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on its own strength. “If you ( BJP leaders) are that capable, I would dare you to snap the ties with the Shiv Sena and contest the BMC polls on your strength. Now-a-days, it has become a habit with the BJP leaders to announce off and on that their party would contest the BMC polls on its own strength”.
“During the 2014 Assembly polls, our friends (BJP) stabbed us in the back. If you have the BJP has guts now, it should confront us in the BMC polls. We will show our allies as to how surgical strikes are conducted. I am confident that the Shiv Sena will emerge victorious in the polls,”Uddhav said, even as he congratulated Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the surgical strikes carried out by the Indian Army on terror camps in Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK).
On the contentious of reservations, Uddhav said: “The Sena is all for giving reservations on economic grounds. Instead of giving reservations on the basis of caste and religion, we would like the State Government to economically weak people”.
Tuesday’s Dussehra rally was politically significant considering that this is 50th year when the Shiv Sena has organised a Dussehra rally, where late Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray had addressed the first Dussehra rally on October 19, 1966, months after the formation of the Barring an exception in 2005 when the party was forced to cancel its rally owing to very heavy rains, Thackeray unfailingly addressed dussehra rallies at the Shivaji Park every year till his death on November 17, 2012.