It is 12pm and unbearably hot at Rahimatpur. Udayanraje Bhonsle, the 13th descendant of Chhatrapati Shivaji and the BJP candidate in the Satara Lok Sabha constituency, is fashionably late for an election meeting that was scheduled at 10am.
People are standing in the scorching sun even though sitting arrangements have been made in the big hall where the meeting is supposed to take place, as they want to welcome ‘Maharaj’. Bhonsle arrives in a black Toyota Fortuner with a fancy number plate—007—and a convoy behind it. Dressed in stiff white kurta and pyjama, he gets out of the vehicle and raises the collar in his trademark style, as people line up to touch his feet.
This story is from the May 19, 2024 edition of THE WEEK India.
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This story is from the May 19, 2024 edition of THE WEEK India.
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