Sena: Cops’ maoist claim is stupid

Mumbai: The Shiv Sena has dubbed as “stupid” the state police’s claim that the five arrested left-wing activists were involved in an alleged Maoist plot to overthrow the Narendra Modi government.

The chief of BJP’s nitpicking ally, Uddhav Thackeray, said in the party mouthpiece Saamana, “The police assertion about the security threat to the PM from Maoists is just a ‘conspiracy theory’. Mr Modi’s security remains robust and there is no need to worry on that front. The government should stop saying that these so-called Maoists can potentially topple the sitting government at the Centre. The people of this country and not Maoists or Naxalites brought down the Congress’ Manmohan Singh-led government. In recent times, governing parties were changed through the democratic process alone.”

“Had these Maoists possessed the power to topple governments, they would not have lost control in West Bengal, Tripura and Manipur. The police must exercise restraint while making claims else Mr Modi and the BJP will be ridiculed once again,” he said.

The Sena chief further said that Mr Modi’s security was of a very high standard and that there was nothing to worry about it.

Former PMs Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi had an element of adventurism in them which led to them losing their lives. However, Mr Modi would never engage in such a thing.

Taking a dig at those who’ve been criticising the recent arrest of five left-wing activists for alleged Maoist links, Mr Thackeray said that “urban Naxals” were involved in philosophising the acts of Naxals in remote areas of Chhattisgarh, Telan-gana, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal and Odisha.

Naxalites were running their own parallel governments in remote areas and several people, including Congress leader Vidya Charan Shukla, had lost their lives in the attacks carried out by them.