Newsmakers: Aditya Thackeray's first ban, Jaya's big rally

Aditya Thackeray

Handling over political mantles to offspring has become passe in India and so, surprising no one, Aditya Thackeray entered politics on Sunday, October 17.

His "coming-out" ceremony took place in a massive rally held by his grandfather Bal Thackeray. He will now head the Yuva Sena faction of the party. 

What did surprise many was the issue he chose as his first step into the divisive world of Marathi politics.

Claiming that Rohinton Mistry's book Such a Long Journey contained passages that were abusive to the party he held rallies and went through the usual repertoire of threats against the Mumbai University, demanding the book's removal from the official literature syllabus.

And it was promptly removed as demanded so Aditya could chalk up his first victory as well. 

Mistry, however, had the last word on Aditya: "As for the grandson of the Shiv Sena leader...what can - what should - one feel about him? Pity, disappointment, compassion? Twenty years old, in the final year of a BA in history, at my own Alma Mater, the beneficiary of a good education, he is about to embark down the Sena’s well-trodden path, to appeal, like those before him, to all that is worst in human nature." 

Image: Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray along with his Son Udhav Thackeray and grandson Aditya Thackeray during the Dusshera rally in Mumbai on Oct 17, 2010.

Aditya Thackeray justifies attack on Mistry's book

Text: Vinayak Hegde

Images: PTI/AP