The Sena chief's nephew and party leader Raj Thackeray, the man behind the book, said he had personally invited Pawar for the book release function.

According to Raj Thackeray, the association between Fernandes and Bal Thackeray is over 50 years old and goes back to the time when the Sena supremo was working as a cartoonist in the daily Free Press Journal where Fernandes had led the workers union.