A day after Uddhav Thackeray dared the rival Shinde Shiv Sena to “come on, kill me”  but “come with an ambulance”, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said here on Friday that he did not want to respond to the Shiv Sena (UBT) chief’s “bol bachchan” (empty talk), while the ruling BJP came down heavily on Uddhav for his remarks.

After rival Sena president and deputy chief minister responded to Uddhav Thackeray’s “come on, kill me” and “ambulance” jibes by saying, “Arey mare hue ko kya marna hai”, Fadnavis dismissed what he called the Sena (UBT) chief’s “bol bachchan” (empty talk).

“I am not going to respond to bol bachchan people. I won’t say anything about such people,” Fadnavis said, when he buttonholed for a comment on Uddhav’s jibes at the Shinde Sena which rules Maharashtra in alliance with the BJP and NCP (Ajit Pawar). 

Addressing a rally on the occasion of the 59th foundation day of the Shiv Sena, Uddhav had borrowed a couple of popular dialogue mouthed by actor Nana Patekar from the 1991 film Prahaar to hit out at the rival Shinde camp. “In the film Prahaar, Nana Patekar takes on a group of goons and says, ‘come on, kill me’. Just like that, I am standing here in front of these traitors and saying - ‘come on, kill me’. If you have the guts, come at me,” Uddhav had said, while accusing the Shinde Sena camp of attempting to “destroy the Thackeray brand” and dared to finish him off politically.

Uddhav had followed it up with another dialogue delivered by Amitabh Bachchan from the film “Trishul” when confronts bad guys with an accompanying ambulance. “But if you dare attack me, come along with an ambulance like in the film starring Amitabh Bachchan because you will meet the same fate,” the Sena (UBT) chief said.

Interestingly enough, Uddhav came with jibes against Shinde, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Maharashtra Fadnavis, after indicating once again that he would align with the MNS led by his cousin Raj Thackeray to contest the crucial Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) polls and regain power. The jibes by Uddhav and response by Eknath Shinde should be seen in the contest of the fact that in June 2022, Shinde, then a senior Shiv Sena leader, had rebelled against the then chief minister and Sena president Uddhav Thackeray, walked out of the party along with 40-odd MLAs leading to the collapse of the government Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), a grand alliance comprising Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress.

Shinde, it may be recalled, later teamed up with the then Opposition BJP to form a new Government in the State. Shinde and Fadnavis were sworn as the Maharashtra chief minister and deputy chief minister respectively on June 30, 2022.

Meanwhile, Maharashtra BJP president and State Revenue Minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule slammed Uddhav for targeting prime minister Narendra Modi, home minister Amit Shah and Fadnavis at his rally.

“It is easy to make personal allegations against respected Modi, Shah and Fadnavis. At a time when these leaders ere touring the entire country and the State, Uddhav Thackeray (who was the chief minister then) was only giving speeches online from Matoshree (the CM’s official residence) The people of Maharashtra have seen this for themselves,” Bawankule said.

“By saying “Shiv Sena is not finished”, he not only lost the ‘Sena’ himself, but also left behind two strong pillars like ‘Shiv’ and ‘Hindutva’ and bowed down at the feet of Sonia Gandhi. When the support base is lost, the noise increases. Yesterday he did exactly that, you keep spewing venom, keep taunting, keep making sarcastic remarks, your future life will be spent in this, people of Maharashtra have already understood this,” the State BJP chief said.

Ridiculing Uddhav, Bawankule said: “Those who say “Mumbai is ours”, should first tell what they did for the Marathi citizens of Mumbai? When they were in power in the BMC, did they do anything on issues like slums, water schemes, education and health? Coastal Road, Metro, Cluster Redevelopment Plan, Slum Rehabilitation Plan for Mumbai — all these were made possible due to the initiatives by Fadnavis, Mumbaikars know this very well”.

Earlier on Thursday evening when his party celebrated the 59th foundation day by holding a parallel rally at Worli in south-central Mumbai, Shinde had referred to the Uddhav Sena’s debacle in the 2024 Maharashtra Assembly polls and said that there was no point in attacking someone who was already finished.