Maharashtra minister and Shiv Sena leader Aaditya Thackeray on Wednesday arrived in Lucknow ahead of his visit to Ayodhya. The minister received a grand welcome from party leaders at the airport. Upon arrival, Thackeray told reporters his Ayodhya visit is ‘not political’ and he referred to the temple town as the ‘land of Ram Rajya’. “When we came for the first time in 2018, we said ‘pehle mandir, phir sarkaar’…the land is not political, it’s the land of ‘Ram Rajya. I will offer prayers and receive blessings,” he said, as quoted by news agency.
Thackeray will drive to Ayodhya from Lucknow.
Aaditya Thackeray is visiting Ayodhya for a day-long pilgrimage and he is set to attend an ‘arti’ on the banks of the Saryu river.
Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut and other party leaders have been in Ayodhya since Monday in order to oversee the preparations for Thackeray’s third visit to the temple town.
Aaditya Thackeray had visited the town in November 2018 and March 2020 along with his father and Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray.
On Monday, Raut had said that “Thackeray will seek the blessings of Ram Lalla and visit the construction site of the Ram temple”. He had asserted that the minister’s visit to the temple town is “not a political programme”.
The visit comes as the BJP and MNS’ Raj Thackeray have criticized the Uddhav Thackeray-led party for “abandoning Hindutva”. Raj Thackeray was scheduled to visit Ayodhya this month but the visit was cancelled.
The BJP MP from Kaiserganj – Brij Bhushan Saran Singh, had been opposing the MNS leader’s visit to the temple town. He has been demanding Raj Thackeray to apologize for “targeting North Indians in Mumbai.”