On May 1, when Maharashtra was celebrating 50 years of its statehood, Pisavle in Dombivli, a small region in the same state, wore a deserted look as thousands of hapless North Indian families were signing a petition expressing their desire to quit the state. They claimed to have suffered invariable attacks by their Maharashtrian neighbours and having been frustrated by the lackadaisical attitude of state police to provide them with protection. They lamented that on April 29, a mob of around 150 local people led by a Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) leader barged into their homes, pulled out men and women, and assaulted them with sticks and iron roads, only because they were not Marathi manoos.
On the same auspicious day, in another incident of caste discrimination, a businessman Majid Khan, who with his wife Gayatri had barely moved into his newly rented flat in Chembur, was asked to vacate the apartment, because the housing society did not welcome Muslims. Khan had even signed the agreement, gone through police verification and had shifted his belongings to the new rented house. But just minutes before guests were to arrive for a house-warming party the flat owner called him to vacate the flat immediately.
Maharashtra attained statehood on May 1, 1960 when the then Bombay State was divided into two states, Maharashtra and Gujarat, on the basis of linguistic difference, under the Saurashtra Re-organisation Act. Fortunately Maharashtra retained old capital Bombay, but later the Shiv Sena government renamed it as Mumbai.
Mumbai, the commercial capital of India, has always been an attractive destination for people of different regions for being economically attractive, commercially sound, culturally enriched and socially improved.
We the Indians feel proud to be the citizens of this nation with diversely spread over 28 states and seven union territories.
Although anti-outsider agitations in Mumbai surfaced in the mid-1960s, but for the last few years saw a massive upsurge in hooliganism in the guise of regionalism backed by some politicians wedded to narrow regionalism.
The recent series of ill treatment to North Indians started on February 3, 2008 when Shiv Sena attacked Samajwadi Party workers who were proceeding to attend a rally organised by the United National Progressive Alliance. The goons attributed the attack to a reaction to the provocative show of muscle power and uncontrolled political and cultural dadagiri of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar migrants and their leaders.
Way back on March 9, 2006, Raj Thackeray, nephew of Bal Thackeray, quit the Shiv Sena and formed the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) after having difference with his mentor.
The Shiv Sena members, who supported Raj’s leadership, joined the MNS. The party was founded on the ideology of being the benefactor of the local Marathi people. Raj Thackeray repeatedly demanded special job reservations for locals. An opponent of the influx of migrants into the state, especially Uttar Bhartiyas predominantly from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, he blamed the large-scale immigration of people from these economically backward states for causing a shortage of jobs for Maharashtrians.
But a Mumbai without outsiders would definitely see an economic collapse: depopulation, labour shortage, uncompetitive wages, a steep fall in real estate prices and a loss of economic vitality. In February 2008, nearly 25,000 North Indian workers fled from Pune, and another 15,000 from Nashik in the wake of the attacks. The migration of workers caused an acute labour shortage, affecting local industries badly. Analysts estimated financial losses between Rs 500 crore and Rs. 700 crore.
MNS workers have deliberately and repeatedly assaulted North Indians. They thrashed taxi drivers, and vandalised their vehicles. They attacked vendors and shopkeepers and destroyed government properties to vent their anger. Sometimes even the innocent succumbed to injuries due to severe beatings. MNS had also assaulted a number of examinees, who had assembled there for the Railway Recruitment Board Exams. Once the MNS chief even questioned the loyalty of Amitabh Bachchan to Maharashtra where he attained fame and popularity, accusing him of showing more interest in his native state Uttar Pradesh. Raj Thackeray had also called the celebration of Chhath Puja celebrated by Biharis a drama and show of arrogance.
Some guess that this hooliganism by the MNS is only a ploy to get cheap popularity in the state.
But it is an irony that no political party active in the state demanded ban or even strongly condemned the deplorable and hateful activities of MNS. The reason is simple – vote matters more. If ban is sought on MNS, it is likely that the political parties other than MNS will lose the ground there.
National media has already termed him as terror monger. In 2008, the cover page of the magazine The Week, depicted Raj Thackeray as Adolf Hitler. The Hindustan Times also published a survey on the front page on February 15, 2008, which said that 73 per cent of Mumbai believed the insular line of the MNS and its president against North Indians was denting Mumbai’s cosmopolitan image.
It is an irony that an untoward incident goes down after a couple of days of hue and cry. We hardly try to examine the ins and outs of the incidents. Hardly the government ponders over the sufferings of the poor as to why they migrate to such metros leaving their families in remote villages. Whatever be the reason, the government must sort out the problem. But the invariable atrocities meted out to the innocents in Maharashtra depict that the local goons are planning to make ‘Maharashtra free from Indians’.