Group editor of Marathi newspaper 'Divya Marathi' Kumar Ketkar has been provided police protection following a complaint against him for making allegedly "uncharitable" remarks about a community to which late Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray belonged
"Despite Balasaheb's father being a social reformer and a militant anti-Brahmin activist - the Thackeray clan is a typical CKP (Chandraseniya Kayastha Prabhu) lower middle-class family from Central Mumbai. This class has never shown any entrepreneurial talent or technological heft," Ketkar had written in the Forbes India issue, dated November 17, 2012.
Thackeray was a member of Chandraseniya Kayastha Prabhu CKP) caste.
This piece kicked up a controversy and Shiv Sainiks led by Sena leader Chintamani Kharkanis lodged a complaint last evening at the Thane police station, even as CKP caste leaders marched to the Thane town police station on Tuesday, demanding action against Ketkar for "misrepresenting" facts.
They demanded police action against Ketkar for his "objectionable" and "incorrect" representation of CKP caste and submitted a complaint to the police who assured them of looking into the case.
"They did not register an FIR or file a non-cognisable case but accepted our complaint. We raised serious objections to Ketkar's uncharitable comments about our community. Bal Thackeray belonged to our clan but it was no reason for making incorrect statements about our community," one of them told PTI.
In June 2008, when he was the Editor of the Marathi daily Loksatta, he had questioned the installation of a Shivaji statue and had to be provided police protection after a mob attacked his house.