Mumbai, Apr 7: The Shiv Sena chief Balasaheb Thackeray, in an article which appeared in the party mouthpiece ‘Saamna’ on Monday, has stated not to drag Amitabh Bachchan into the son of the soil controversy as he did not belong to any particular region.

Thackeray has written that Amitabh would fight for the state where he worked and where he had been living for the past 40 years.

Recently, an editorial in ‘Saamna’ asked Amitabh to show more loyalty to the place where he was working than where he was born, mentioning that though he was born in Uttar Pradesh, he had achieved stardom in Mumbai.
He was also asked to follow the example of Tamil actor Rajnikanth, who joined the recent Tamil film industry’s protest against Karnataka over the Hogenakkal drinking water project, though he hailed from that state and from Maharastra.

"Amitabh Bachchan is our family friend. I have neither said anything against him nor written against him in the editorial. The hue and cry, which has been created by the media regarding the news in ‘Saamna’, is condemnable. Our relations with him are not so weak that it can be broken by electronic media news," Thackeray said in a statement.

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati, however, came under attack. In his article, Thackeray writes that Mayawati is troubling Amitabh and Jaya Bachchan for no reason.

Earlier, the actress-turned-MP of Samajwadi Party, Jaya Bachchan had accused Mayawati of pursuing action against her husband for cheap publicity.

It may be recalled that the Additional District Magistrate (Finance) of Barabanki District Shirish Dubey, had on March 31 issued a notice to Bachchan, accusing him of undervaluing the stamp duty on a plot of land that he had bought in the area. (ANI)