Remember how ‘Indira is India’ slogan led to Congress’ defeat, Sena tells BJP after GST clash

Following a clash and much heckling between members of the Shiv Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) at an event in the Mumbai civic body earlier this week, the Shiv Sena, in an editorial in mouthpiece Saamana on Friday, condemned those who picked a fight chanting Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s name.

The editorial pointed out former prime minister the late Indira Gandhi had to lose elections after Congress sycophants started shouting ‘Indira is India’ slogan. “The angry spark of this disrespect grew into a raging fire that ultimately led to her defeat. In the 1971 war, she had brought Pakistan to its knees before India, but yet she had to taste defeat. The defeat was because of the extremist Indira-bhakti (devotion for Indira) on display,” it said.

The Shiv Sena editorial said even Modi will agree that his name should taken with pride and not in madness.

Read: GST event in Mumbai: Shiv Sena leaders abuse PM Modi

“The chief minister and the BJP chief should pinch themselves and ask was chanting Modi’s name in insanity necessary at the event in the Mumbai civic body,” the party said in the editorial. It said such people, irrespective of whether they come from a political or a religious background, are real threat to this nation.

At the event, state finance minister Sudhir Mungantiwar presented a Rs647.34 crore cheque to Mumbai Mayor Vishwanath Mahadeshwar and Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray as a first compensation for the BMC’s loss of revenue from the octroi duty, scrapped under the new Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime.

BJP corporators shouted ‘Modi Modi’ as Thackeray stepped on to the dais, prompting Sena members to pass a defamatory remarks against the prime minister. This led to sloganeering and heckling between the two parties until Municipal Commissioner Ajoy Mehta requested the BMC corporators to calm down.

“Some have given this the colour of aggression between the Shiv Sena and BJP. We have never bothered about these colours. If someone is deliberately trying to put the Shiv Sena down, then we will have to show we are Maratha by caste, our religion is Maharashtra and our gotra is Shivaji Maharaj,” the Sena said.