Know Your Leader | Uddhav Thackeray: With strong legacy to shoulder, astute Sena chief balances ideology with realpolitik

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Taking over the throne 

According to observers and Sena leaders, after the death of his father— Sena patriarch Bal Thackeray— Uddhav faced the dual challenges of coming out of his shadow, as also handling the BJP's rising influence.

While his rivals, such as Maharashtra Navanirman Sena (MNS) chief and estranged cousin, Raj; the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the BJP itself, were hoping for Uddhav to stumble, he managed to grab a grip. He also managed to negotiate a line with BJP, its partner, a task that many were skeptical Uddhav would be able to achieve.

"According to me, Uddhav had two immediate tasks ahead of him after Bal Thackeray's death. First, the fact that the senior Thackeray was considered Hindu Hriday samrat, and the second was that the BJP was projecting Narendra Modi as the next Hindu Hriday Samrat," Prakash Pawar, HOD of political science at Kolhapur University, told Moneycontrol.

"Uddhav had to build his image on the background of all this," Pawar said, adding that had he tried pushing himself as the leader of the Hindus while Modi was trying to fill that vacuum, he would have failed.

"But he picked up an alternative to that. Instead of running after a new image, he chose to firm up his existing image. And he was flexible. At that time, Sena was struggling with seats, but he managed to increase Sena's seats in Lok Sabha," Pawar said, adding that Uddhav exercised flexibility and firmness according to circumstances, which worked in his favour.

"He could carve out his own identity due to this," Pawar said.

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Backroom strategist, frontline leader

By the time Thackeray took charge of a party jostling for space and identity in a rapidly changing political space, he had been around the corridors of power long enough to understand how things work. He made his first public appearance in 1995, but had largely been a backroom manager and sharp observer of Sena while the party ceded space to his cousin Raj, who liked to believe that he was, if not direct, then the natural heir to the Sena throne.

A wedge between Raj and Uddhav, in the making since 1999 and reportedly created by senior Sena leaders themselves, finally burst out in the open in 2006, when Raj went his way to form the MNS. Uddhav reportedly had been nursing his own plans for the party, and as the differences with his brother began to grow, he forced Bal Thackeray to declare him as Sena's working president, thus managing to get formal blessings. This was a symbolic gesture that went a long way in drumming up support of the rank and file.

But the cadres have always bemoaned the Congress for its dynastic politics, and Thackeray Sr used choicest words and expressions to launch attacks against the Gandhis. That didn’t stop him from handing his son the top berth, though. "But who would lead the party if not Uddhav sahib?" a shakha pramukh asked. "He knows the party in and out. And only Balasaheb’s son could have carried forward his legacy, no one else," he said.

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Cadre speak

A complaint that Shiv Sena functionaries, in Mumbai at least, have against their chief is that the man has a limited presence on the space where all news is made these days — social media.
"He has to realise that the days of street battle are over, it is time to take the Sena on social media, ramp up its presence," a Sena functionary told Moneycontrol. While the functionary said that Thackeray needs to be surrounded by a team of strategists that look at taking the party’s politics to new frontiers, Thackeray, he said, doesn't seem to be taking steps towards that front anytime soon.

"Sena has a strong street-based cadre which functions in a particular way, where the leader is held in high regard. If he (Thackeray) can firm up that connect through social media, where a lot of Sena workers are active, it will work wonders," said a Shakha pramukh, who added that simple things, such as a selfie, or a birthday wish by Thackeray will go a long way in connecting with his supporters, especially party workers.

That, according to observers, is important, since Sena depends largely on its loyalists on the street who complete the door-to-door tasks for the party. While that is a Sena legacy which was established and improved upon by its former supremo, Bal Thackeray, this is an age to take it forward, Sena workers say.