Eknath
Shinde, the man who broke the Shiv Sena in half and more, celebrated Ganesh
Chaturthi at his residence on Wednesday, August 31. Shinde, 58, Maharashtra’s
new chief minister’s Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations were observed closely across
the country. In Mumbai, it is the Shiv Sena that takes an immense role in Ganesh
Chaturthi celebrations. With Shinde claiming to be the real heir to Shiv Sena’s
Hindutva ideology, his Ganesh Chaturthi celebration made a mark on social
media.

As pictures
and videos of Shinde’s Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations surfaced on social media, Mumbaikars
and others immediately drew comparisons to Ganesh festival celebrations last
year, when Balasaheb Thackeray’s son Uddhav Thackeray was chief minister. In
2021, Ganesh Chaturthi fell on September 10. At the time, Maharashtra, and
especially Mumbai was reeling under a rising volume of COVID-19 cases.
Consequently, the Maharashtra government had imposed several restrictions on
celebrations.

The Mumbai
Police had imposed Section 144 across the financial capital during the
festival, from September 10 to 19. Moreover, the Brihanmumbai Municipal
Corporation (BMC), the financial capital’s civic body, had disallowed physical
darshan of Ganesh mandals. No more than 10 people were allowed to partake in
processions to bring the deity and for immersions.

The strict
curbs had come under severe criticism, primarily from Hindutva groups.

This year,
Eknath Shinde is the chief minister and there are no restrictions on Ganesh
festival celebrations.

Sharing the
video of Eknath Shinde offering prayers, Rahul Kumar Pandey, a Twitter user
wrote: “Today is the victory of common man as Ganapati is celebrated by Hindutva
hero.”

“We all
need a leader like him who always do the best for welfare of the people,” wrote
Sai, another Twitter user.

Yashwardhan
Singh wrote: “What a great initiative has been taken by our favourite leader
Eknath Shinde sir by telling us the importance of this Ganesh Chaturthi I am so
much happy to hear this news.”

Here are
other tweets celebrating Eknath Shinde for celebrating Ganapati the way he did.

Ganesh
Chaturthi is a Hindu festival celebrating the birth of Lord Ganesh. It’s a
10-day festival. In Mumbai, nearly 150,000 Ganesh idols are immersed every
year. As the clay idols dissolve, Lord Ganesh is believed to have returned to
his celestial abode.