The inaugural ceremony of the Chipi Airport in Sindhudurg on Saturday saw sparks flying between the political opponents Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and Union Minister Narayan Rane. Claiming his immense contribution to the project, Rane alleged that the people who opposed the development of the Sindhudurg district were sitting on the dais. In his rejoinder to the former Shiv Sainik, the CM responded saying that the occasion didn’t warrant “throwing a fit” and remarked that liars had been expelled from the Shiv Sena a long time ago by the party’s founder and his father Bal Thackeray. The two shared the dais after 16 years, sitting next to each other, but maintaining physical distance, due to Covid-19 protocols. Apart from a bout of slogan shouting, no untoward incident was reported from the airport, which on Saturday started operating flights from Mumbai.

‘Worked to build Konkan’

All eyes were on the speeches the two leaders made, because Rane had promised to “expose the people in the Sena”, who allegedly extorted money from contractors and were now claiming credit for projects like the airport that they had opposed in the past. Rane, who is currently serving as the minister of the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises of India, stuck to his promise, and though he didn’t name anyone, he gave enough hints about the people he was referring to. “Uddhavaji, I request you to appoint a person to know the ground situation here, because people who feed you information are lying. I would be politicising the event if I mention who goes where, who has stopped the road work, who had opposed this airport, and who stalled the Sea World project. I have photographs of the agitation, which was led by this person,” he said, adding that “whatever good he did for Sindhudurg and the rest of the Konkan was because of the blessings of Balasaheb”. “But, nobody comes close [as me], when working for the development of the Konkan region,” claimed Rane, insisting that he didn’t want to share the credit with the late Sena founder. He listed the incomplete supporting infrastructure work at the airport and appealed to the CM’s son and tourism minister Aaditya Thackeray to work hard.