Both Chavan and Amitabh were billed to participate in the closing ceremony of the Sammelan on Sunday evening, but the organisers announced early today that the CM would be attending the event later this evening, instead of the closing ceremony. Bachchan would recite his father’s poems at the concluding session tomorrow.
Chavan was criticised by his colleagues in the Congress for attending a function in the company of Bachchan in Mumbai last week. Hours after the event, Chavan called a late-evening press conference to announce that he would have skipped the function had he known that Bachchan was in attendance.
Meanwhile, Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray attacked the Congress for attempting to isolate Bachchan from Maharashtra’s public life. “Amitabh Bachchan is not a dacoit or terrorist to be treated like this,” an editorial in party mouthpiece Saamna said.
“Amitabh is being attacked only because he is the brand ambassador of Gujarat....that too by the Congress that has Sonia Gandhi as its brand ambassador,” the editorial said. Saamna also raked up the issue of Sonia Gandhi accepting Indian citizenship 17 years after her marriage to Rajiv Gandhi. Thackeray also praised the NCP for inviting Bachchan for the function to inaugurate a lane of the Bandra-Worli sealink.
