Exactly a week after he went online with an emotional 18-minute address and left the Maharashtra Chief Minister's residence amid a fledgling revolt in his party, Uddhav Thackeray did an encore on Wednesday and quit the job altogether, electing to bow out in the face of a vote in the assembly that he seemed certain to lose.
In his first address since Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde left Mumbai for Gujarat's Surat with 21 MLAs in the dead of night last Monday - Mr Thackeray had said he was "ready to quit" anytime, but stopped short of announcing his resignation as Chief Minister.
The 61-year-old said he was "hurt" at his own party men turning on him and spoke his heart out to Maharashtra and his party - all online, given his Covid positive status. Some would even say his voice was shaky, Mr Thackeray said, adding that it would be on account of the coronavirus.
The speech was seen helping him recover some ground, as he countered a perception of reticence and inaccessibility with a booster dose of his fireside chats that became a regular affair at the height of the pandemic.
The same tone and teleprompter-less style returned on Wednesday, when the Shiv Sena chief said he was stepping aside because he did not "want a hand in the blood of Shiv Sainiks that may be spilt tomorrow".
The assertion once again appeared to invoke the emotional connect shared by the Thackerays and the Sainiks - with an apparent intent to have the cadre come to his rescue.
"Those whom we promoted and built up, they are the ones who have betrayed us... I came to power unexpectedly, and I'm exiting in a similar fashion... Sena is one family, will not let it be pulled apart. I am not going anywhere, I will gather all our supporters, we will recoup," he said.
And just like last time when he went out of the front door of the Chief Minister's official residence 'Varsha', he drove to Governor BS Koshyari's residence to personally hand over the resignation. On his way back, he stopped by a temple and was again mobbed by a flock of supporters, unperturbed by the Mumbai rain.
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