Star Watch with Veenu Sandal

The question that now dogs Bal Thackeray — the man with the acid tongue and an iron will, is whether he will continue his sway over the politics of Maharashtra and indeed, as partner of the NDA, over that of the country.

The cards foretell that despite the current flashpoint, Thackeray will continue to ride through the storm, his invectives intact. Thackeray has that great ability to convert setbacks into victories.

However, there is a slight difference. The cards indicate that while he’ll continue to roar, his actions will be very finely judged and attuned to ground realities. Increasingly, his strong words will form the iron fist, while his actions will be like a velvet glove. For instance, he’ll hover on the brink, aware that he has the compelling force of his past and the potential to stir up trouble as a powerful ally, but will leave it to others to find a solution to the crisis that he now faces.

Significantly, while it will continue to be others who will run around to defuse the situation, Bal Thackeray himself will not remain implacable — he’ll always leave a door open. This does not, of course, imply that he will compromise on his basic tenets or philosophy. The period between January-February 2001 and March 2002 is a period of great visibility for him. But he will be willing to make concessions in the national interest, if the situation so demands. It is this astute mellowing, this strategic restraint designed to extract maximum mileage which will mark his actions in the period ahead. However, while this will make it easier to deal with him and his followers, it will also represent a challenge for him to keep his hard-liners in tow — a challenge of which he is well aware.

Always shrewd, the increasing use of his expertise in calculating where he and the Shiv Sena can derive maximum advantage will also make him more dangerous in a way — and yet, paradoxically, though his bite will no longer be as deep as before, his mass influence will hold, even though a new shift will be evident in his actions. Actually, the fact that Bal Thackeray’s party is a member of the NDA at the Centre has played a role in the evolution of a new, more comprehensive and more constructive vision for Thackeray himself. Incidentally, there are two other roles which could have brought Bal Thackeray considerable glory : as a film star and as a ladies man, especially with the middle class. Indeed, whatever his role, there will seldom be an erosion of women’s support for him.

(Veenu Sandal read Bal Thackeray’s cards on July 17, 2000)

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