Headlines
Shiv Sena gloats over Narayan Rane's by-poll debacle
Mumbai, April 16
"We can defeat a thousand
(Narayan) Ranes... It is not easy to challenge us...This is a party of
machos. Anyone who dares us, will be reduced to dust," the Shiv Sena
said on Thursday.
The party was gloating over the defeat of
Congress heavyweight and former Maharashtra chief minister Narayan Rane
in the state assembly by-poll from Bandra East constituency on
Wednesday.
In a no-holds barred attack, the Shiv Sena said the
people of Bandra East have shown the door not only to Rane, but also to
the "offsprings of the Nizams" - referring to the All India
Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) leaders, the Owaisi brothers,
hailing from Hyderabad, an erstwhile princely state ruled by the Nizams.
By
putting up Rane, the Congress has 'disrobed' itself in public and even
Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar must have heard the
Sena Tiger's roar, said an editorial in the party mouthpiece Saamana on
Thursday.
Pointing out how doubts were raised about the by-poll's
outcome in the backyard of 'Matoshri', the family home of the late
Shiv Sena founder-patriarch Bal Thackeray, the party said that "a
traitor (Rane) has been trounced... and blown off like a dried leaf."
The
Sena said the "traitor who backstabbed Bal Thackeray" has lost by a
20,000-vote margin. In October 2014 assembly elections from Kudal
constituency, he had lost by 10,000 votes.
"What is Rane? The
next time, this arrogant and treacherous man will be wiped off with at
least a three-fold defeat margin, we have no doubts," the Sena declared.
The
edit pointed out how it was due to the Shiv Sena that Rane earned name
and fame, and was catapulted as the party's chief minister in 1989
during the first Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance government in
Maharashtra.
Warning that the people of Bandra East, who packed
off Rane and the Owaisis, would not forgive "such snakes spewing venom",
the Sena vowed that nobody can henceforth stop the flying horse
(Ashwamedh) called Shiv Sena.
The edit came in response to the
Congress' embarrassing defeat in Bandra East on Wednesday at the hands
of a political greenhorn -- Shiv Sena candidate Trupti Sawant, widow of
the former party legislator and strongman Bala Sawant.
In
contrast, Prahaar, a newspaper owned by the Rane family lauded Narayan
Rane for taking up challenge in Bandra East despite heavy adversities
and yet putting up a spectacular performance.
"Hence, this
election should be termed as 'Rane fought, Congress lost... he secured
33,703 votes compared to the last election when the Congress candidate
in Bandra East had forfeited his poll security deposit," Prahaar said.