Thackeray will: Jaidev claims father told him about his share

MUMBAI: The dispute between Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and his elder brother Jaidev Thackeray took a new turn on Monday. Jaidev told the Bombay HC that his father, the late Bal Thackeray, had told him he wanted to “bequeath sufficient share of the family estate” to him, and that it is one of the reasons he suspects the authenticity of the will.

Jaidev revealed that he and his father had the conversation at Matoshree, the Thackerays’ family home in Bandra, on the evening of October 16, 2011. He spoke about it while being cross-examined by Uddhav’s lawyer, Rohit Kapadia. Jaidev further said his father had advised him against discussing their conversation with Uddhav, as he feared it would cause “discord or acrimony between the two brothers”.

“My father, in no way, hinted that he wanted to disinherit me,” said Jaidev, adding that once he decided to contest his father’s will in HC, his relations with Uddhav began to “turn sour”.

“Uddhav does not take my calls and refuses to respond to my text messages. I have tried to get in touch with him many times, but he does not seem interested. We haven’t met even once in the last three years,” Jaidev said.

Jaidev also told the court their father had told him sometime in 2011 that “Uddhav had taken his signatures on some documents, but had not revealed to him the contents of those documents”. He, however, did not discuss this even with Uddhav.

“My father told me that whenever he and I had a discussion on any subject, he did not want me to take it up with Uddhav or others because that might lead to discord between us brothers, or cause disagreement in the family.”

In his affidavit filed before the HC to support his evidence, Jaidev said that on December 14, 2014, he asked Uddhav about the will, but Uddhav told him that “there was no will”.

Jaidev said he first learnt about his father’s will and his exclusion from it through a news story in the online edition of the Telegraph in December 2012.

“I made numerous attempts to contact Uddhav, but realised that he was trying to avoid me deliberately. I suspected that he wanted to deliberately and intentionally deny me my rightful share of one-third of the family property,” the affidavit reads.

Jaidev further said he then got “suspicious” and “secretly recorded on his Nokia phone, the conversation” that ensued between him and Uddhav.

Jaidev’s lawyer, Seema Sarnaik, submitted a CD that contained the recorded conversation and the printed transcript before the court. Justice GS Patel, however, is yet to decide upon the admissibility of the CD as evidence.

Justice Patel observed that the “mobile phone on which the conversation was recorded, the memory card, laptop through which it was transferred on the CD, etc, had not been made available to the court”. And that the conversation was recorded “illicitly”.

Jaidev has filed a suit in January 2013, challenging the validity of his father’s will, claiming that he was of an unsound mind at the time the will was finalised and that Uddhav “influenced his father”.

The court is in the process of recording depositions of witnesses and has already completed the cross-examination of witnesses on Uddhav’s side.

According to Uddhav, Bal Thackeray, who passed away on November 17, 2012, had made his “last will while he was of sound mind in December 2011”.

HC is likely to continue Jaidev’s cross-examination on Tuesday.