MUMBAI: Raj and Uddhav Thackeray's maternal uncle today said the estranged cousins will "surely come together in the interests of Maharashtra."
"If they come together, Balasaheb's vision will be fulfilled. They should have come together by now. But it is better late than never," Chandumama Vaidya said.
"I feel they should come together in the interests of people of Maharashtra," Vaidya said, talking to reporters after paying tributes to the late Sena patriarch.
"Raj and Uddhav were a big support to Balasaheb. He should have been here today and seen the two bonding at his memorial today," he said.
"Whether they come together politically depends on them. But for me, the fact that they are meeting is enough," he said.
"I always go to their residences and tell them of one's feelings for the other. Be it MNS workers or Sena workers and people of Maharashtra, everyone wants the cousins to come together, he said.
"When Raj's daughter was hospitalised after a road accident recently, I had requested Uddhav and he visited the hospital. After all it is a blood relation," he said.
Meanwhile, NCP leader Chhagan Bhujbal -- himself a former Shiv Sena leader -- said his best wishes will always be with the cousins if they decide to come together. "People feel that they should come together. And their coming together isn't impossible," he said.
Raj Thackeray quit Shiv Sena in 2006 and formed Maharashtra Navnirman Sena. He and Uddhav are related from the maternal side too as their mothers were sisters.