MUMBAI: Keeping up the sharp attack on Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's barb on Hindutva ideologue Vinayak Damodar Savarkar the Shiv Sena led by Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray (UTB) has said that the Congress party will not win by making defamatory statements against Savarkar.

In an editorial in Sena UBT party mouthpiece newspaper 'Saamana' today which is also considered Sena UTB leadership's political opinion said that Gandhi's attack on Savarkar will lead to the ebbing of sympathy which he gained due to his disqualification as Lok Sabha Member of Parliament due being convicted by a court in Gujarat. 

On March 24 a court in Surat sentenced him to two years in jail in a defamation case following which his MP seat was promptly cancelled by the Lok Sabha secretariat.

A day earlier on Sunday while addressing a rally at Malegaon in the Konkan region, Thackeray had slammed Gandhi's remarks on his conviction saying that he would never apologize as he was Gandhi and not Savarkar. 

During the rally Thackeray said that rally that Savarkar was his and his party's idol and they would not tolerate any insult to him, also warning that it would not tolerate any disrespect to Savarkar. He said that Savarkar had wowed to fight against British slavery at the age of 12 and that Gandhi should take a similar oath.

The Saamna editorial said that Gandhi's remarks on Savarkar will not affect the faith of the people in the Hindutva ideologue and Sena UTB was with Congress and its leaders had even joined his ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ in a bid to save democracy, but such statements will create a rift between the Shiv Sena (UBT) and the Congress.

The Shiv Sena (UBT) along with the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) are part of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) that was in power till the Eknath Shinde-led Sena aligned with the Bharatiya Janata Party to form the government. 

The edit piece also covertly criticised the ruling party led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying that the country was being ruled by a dictator who is always scared and that he first starts controlling the judiciary and parliament and destroying the opposition.