All Options Open, BJP Lied to Us on Alliance Promise: Uddhav Thackeray after Sena Blamed for Stalemate

New Delhi: Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray on Friday tore into ally BJP for trying “to prove him a liar”, claiming the saffron party had agreed to share the chief minister’s post in Maharashtra during his talks with Amit Shah.

Thackeray said he would fulfill the promise made to his father, late Sena founder Bal Thackeray, to install a Sena chief minister in the state, and does not need Devendra Fadnavis or Shah for this.

Thackeray addressed the media soon after Fadnavis handed over his resignation to Maharashtra Governor BC Koshyar and was asked to continue as caretaker chief minister.

Reacting strongly to Fadnavis’s claim that there had been no agreement on sharing the chief minister’s post for two-and-half years, Thackeray constantly reiterated his hurt at being portrayed as a liar by the BJP. He did not hold talks with the BJP after the Assembly poll results came in on October 24 as he could not tolerate being called a liar, he said.

Thackeray also denied Fadnavis’s claim that Sena leaders targeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He did not attack Modi but criticised the NDA government from time to time over its policies, Thackeray said.

Thackeray addressed a press conference after Fadnavis tendered his resignation while blaming the Sena for the impasse. Refuting the Sena's claim, Fadnavis asserted that "in my presence", no decision had been taken by the two parties over sharing the chief minister's post.

The Sena had claimed that before the Lok Sabha polls, the two allies had decided to share the chief minister's post in the next term for two-and-half-years each.

Fadnavis said he had called Thackeray for breaking the impasse many times, but "Uddhav-ji did not take my calls". The Sena's "policy" of not talking with the BJP but holding talks with the opposition Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) was wrong, he said.

There has been no headway in government formation in the state even a fortnight after Assembly poll results were announced on October 24. The BJP and the Sena are locked in a tussle over the chief minister’s post, resulting in a stalemate despite the poll results giving the saffron alliance a combined seat strength of 161, way past the 145-majority mark in the 288-member House.