Amid heavy censure of the Shiv Sena mouthpiece Saamna for its repeated acerbic comments, especially one endorsing Muslim disenfranchisement, the paper’s editor and Sena MP Sanjay Raut has dared political parties to run social change campaigns for Muslims if they really cared for the community.
“If you want their development, there are various other things that you can do. Why don’t you run an anti-burqa campaign? Or one for common civil law or social campaign for family planning for them,” Mr. Raut said.
He faced severe condemnation for his remarks that the voting rights of Muslims should be revoked to prevent their exploitation through appeasement politics.
Speaking in the Lok Sabha, many opposition leaders including Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge sought criminal action against Saamna and demanded that it be closed down after the paper's editorial on Muslim voting rights.
However, talking to The Hindu in the Saamna office, Mr. Raut said his remarks were “twisted” by the media and that his editorial only endorsed Sena founder Bal Thackeray’s views against appeasement politics.
He clarified that he was not in favour of any disenfranchisement. “I spoke to Mr. Kharge on phone and asked him if he had read the entire editorial,” Mr. Raut said.
The controversial editorial which came immediately after voting for the Bandra (East) bypoll, in which the AIMIM contested, seems to have been spurred by the Hyderabad-based party’s aggressive campaigning in the State.
Mr. Raut claims that the AIMIM leaders, the Owaisi brothers, poisoned the Muslim youth with their comments. The so-called secular parties, he said, did not actually care about Muslims. If you took away the voting rights of Muslims, the true colour of these parties would be exposed as they would then have nothing to do with the welfare of the minority, Mr. Raut explained.
“It’s not my statement. Balasaheb believed that there was no minority or majority; there were only two religions, the poor and the rich. But Congress started the politics of minority and trapped Muslims in it and only made use of the Muslims as vote banks,” Mr. Raut said.
The Saamna , which was started in 1989 by the Sena founder, as a means of daily connect with the cadre is today an important political tool of the party. With Mr. Thackeray's death, the need for the Saamna is felt "even more," Mr. Raut said.
The Sena in recent times has renewed its aggressive stance with a streak of vitriolic editorials reflecting Marathi chauvinism and specially targeting the minorities. However, Mr. Raut believes, there was nothing new in it and despite the criticism there would be relenting to the aggression. “We have always been aggressive. That’s our strength,” Mr. Raut said.
Claiming that the paper represented the “views of the Marathi people,” Mr. Raut said the Saamna is an “authority, which represented a thought.
