Raj Thackeray: Winning friends and influencing foes vide wedding invites

Mumbai: Maharashtra Navnirman Sena President Raj Thackeray is currently on a mega-mission to invite leading personalities for his son Amit’s upcoming wedding - and thereby winning friends and influencing foes ahead of the 2019 elections. On Sunday, he set political tongues a-wagging after a nearly two-hour meeting with Nationalist Congress Party President Sharad Pawar, ostensibly to present the wedding invite and solicit his blessings for the young couple, Amit and Mitali Borude.

More so, since it came a day after his well-publicised meeting with cousin and Shiv Sena President Uddhav Thackeray, whom he personally went to invite for the wedding. Even more significant, Thackeray is expected to call on Congress President Rahul Gandhi in New Delhi soon, to, of course - invite him for the Jan 27 wedding. However, NCP spokesperson Nawab Malik promptly dismissed Raj’s call on Pawar as “purely social and non-political”, helpfully qualifying that “there was no discussion on elections” during the long meet.

Nevertheless, informed political sources on both sides hint at something more being cooked than only a wedding feast - possibly an electoral arrangement with the help of the NCP chief - to enable the 13-year old MNS regain a foothold in state and national politics. In the past few years, Thackeray has been a stringent critic of both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Amit Shah. Though it sounded sweet music to the ears of the state opposition parties, most were reluctant to politically sup with him, leaving the MNS virtually a pariah hungering for power. (IANS)

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