Sonu Sood Meets Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray Hours After Sanjay Raut's 'Mahatma' Dig!

Lately, Bollywood actor Sonu Sood is being hailed as a real-life hero on social media, for sending migrant workers stuck in Mumbai amid the COVID-19 pandemic back to their hometowns. However, on Sunday (June 7, 2020), Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut stirred a controversy by slamming the actor in his weekly column in Sena's mouthpiece Saamana.

Hours after Raut's dig at Sonu Sood, the actor paid a visit to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray's residence. Later, Uddhav's son and Maharashtra MLA, Aaditya Thackeray took to his Twitter page and wrote, "This evening Sonu Sood met up with CM Maharashtra Uddhav Thackeray ji along with Minister Aslam Shaikh and me. Better together, stronger together to assist as many people through as many people. Good to have met a good soul to work for the people together."

Post the meeting, Sonu Sood reacted to Sanjay Raut's verbal attack on him. While speaking to a section of media, he said, "They are also supporting it and it's not about any particular party or anything... we have to support all the people who are suffering... every party from Kashmir to Kanya Kumari has supported me.."

For those who don't know, Sanjay Raut had raised questions over the sudden appearance of "Mahatma" Sood in Mumbai to help the migrants during COVID-19 lockdown in his article in Saamana. He claimed that BJP is responsible for publicising Sood's work on a wider scale, so that to put the state government in a bad light.

He sarcastically called the Bollywood star 'Mahatma' Sood, and questioned how he could have done all this without the backing of a political party.

Sanjay Raut wrote, "Sood sent a plane to Ernakulam in Kerala to rescue 177 people who wanted to go back to Odisha. The Odisha CM thanked Sood for this. How he could have done this without political and administrative support?"

He claimed that the actor's work was all about TV channels and PR machinery working overtime. "During lockdown we didn't get an aircraft, how did Sood get an aircraft to transport the migrants? He has done good work, but there is a political director behind him. This is my view and many people have told me. This was an attempt to show the state government in poor light," he slammed the actor in his article.

He further wrote, "Sood is an actor whose profession is to deliver dialogues scripted by someone else and make a living out of it. There are many people like Sood who would promote any political party if paid well."

Raut also took a dig at the Maharashtra Governor for calling Sonu Sood to Raj Bhavan to praise his work, and wrote, "But the doctors, police, Municipal corporation staff, nurses, bank employees, who have been working for the last three months, could not shine as no publicity companies appointed by the BJP promoted them."