Shiv Sena chief Balasaheb Thackeray, who on Thursday stepped out of his house after almost two years to address a meeting of newly-elected party MLAs and prominent party leaders, said he did not care if anyone chose to leave the party.

Apparently reacting to reports that many Sena leaders were likely to defect to Raj Thackeray-led MNS following Sena-BJP combine’s defeat in the recently concluded Assembly elections, Balasaheb said: “Those who want to leave the party can leave now, I don’t really care.”

“The party has been through highs and lows. It is like an ocean, there are high and low tides,” Balasaheb said in his 18-minute speech at the Shiv Sena Bhavan.

Clarifying on his earlier editorial comment that Marathi people had backstabbed him and his party, Balasaheb said he had only intended to say that Marathi people had turned their backs on him. He then went on to question Saamna Editor Sanjay Raut, asking him if the word backstabbing was inserted by him.

In the second consecutive editorial in party mouthpiece Saamna after the election results, Balasaheb had blamed “ungrateful” Marathi people of Mumbai for “betraying” the party.