When the British, following their victory in 1857 re-formed the administrative space into what they called ?presidencies?, they did not care to observe linguistic norms in their demarcation. The old Bengal Presidency, for instance, included a portion of today'sOrissa, almost all of Assam and Bihar and the presidency of Madras included some Telugu districts, certainly all of Tamil districts, Malabar, a Malayalam-speaking district and South Kanara, a multilingual district. There was no logic whatsoever in the demarcation of presidencies, whether Bengal, Madras, Bombay or the United Province. At one time the Bombay presidency included Sind, the present districts of Gujarat and Maharashtra and some of present-day Karnataka.
It was the Congress Party which was the first to classify its provincial committees along linguistic lines and this, in due course, was to encourage first the Telugu leaders and subsequently leaders from other multilingual states to demand fresh demarcation of states on the original Congress model. Linguistic states certainly have their merit. They help to being together people from all castes, creeds, communities and religion. That is why even Jawaharlal Nehru who was originally opposed to the formation of linguistic states ultimately decided to give in. Madras (now Chennai) was recognisably the accepted capital of Tamil Nadu as was Hyderabad of Andhra Pradesh and Ahmedabad of Gujarat. Bombay (now Mumbai) presented a problem. Unlike other provincial cities it has always had a distinct character of its own. In the first place it is home in a large measure of people speaking several languages, apart from Marathi.
In the early years of its development, it was the stronghold of Parsis who spoke their own version of Gujarati. The city was developed primarily by Parsi and Gujarati entrepreneurship, Konkan mill labour, Telugu road builders, Tamil and Malayalis who largely formed the managerial infrastructure of business houses and the Shettys of Kanara who went into the hotel business. The city attracted people from all over India. The film world was largely inhabited by people from the north and Bombay was a mosaic, a dome of many-coloured glass, and happily accepted as such. There was wholesome realisation and acceptance of the role each regional or linguistic group could play. That is, until the Shiv Sena came into existence. Prosperity of certain non-Marathi speaking classes was viewed with jealousy which was transformed into hatred. The entrepreneurial talent and organisational abilities of non-Marathi speaking classes were held to ransom; innocent and defenceless south Indian clerks were occasionally manhandled by Shiv Sena followers on the theory that they held a monopoly in clerical jobs in business concerns.
The appeal was to the worst chauvinism and fears of the lower middle classes among the Marathi-speaking population. It worked. Shiv Sena delegates got elected to the Bombay Municipal Corporation and Shiv Sena captured political power inevitably leading to financial gains. Shri Bal Thackeray came to be a figure to be reckoned with. The sponsored anti-Madrassi sentiment thereafter voluntarily came under check. It had served its purpose. It had succeeded in pitching the Shiv Sena to reach unbelievable political heights. The term ?Madrassi? was an all-encompassing word left largely undefined because the Shiv Sena karmiks couldn'tdifferentiate a Tamilian from a Malayali or an Andhraite. All linguistic groups lived in ghettoes. It was difficult for the Shiv Sena leaders to accept the fact that the Marathi lower middle classes were unaccustomed to physical labour such as road building, construction of houses, hoteliering and sundry jobs for which outside labour was sorely needed. What mattered was access to power and one way to achieve it was fanning hatred, against ?outsiders?. The tactics were the invention of the Shiv Sena founder but these are now being re-invented by his nephew Raj Thackeray who was brushed aside as heir to the Shiv Sena throne and is now determined to come into his own. The nephew is carrying on a vendetta against his uncle at the cost of national unity, a sad story. So old hatred are being resurrected.
Then the target were the ?Madrassis?. Now the hatred is against the poor and the needy from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. What has Amitabh Bachchan done to Maharashtra it is being asked not realising that Amitabh Bachchan has done more for not just Maharashtra but for the whole of India, more than all the Shiv Sena leaders and sainiks put together have done. Forgotten is the fact that Mumbai is not just the capital of Maharashtra but is the economic capital of all India and denying entry into Mumbai of people from the rest of India is destroying the very concept of One India One People. If Raj Thackeray'sNavnirman Sena?Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS)?prevents people from other parts of India to enter Mumbai, what will prevent? outsiders? from stopping Marathi manus from crossing Maharashtra border, since he will be an ?alien? in the MNS lingo? Logic has never been a Shiv Sena strong point. What counts is an illogical approach to protecting self-interests howsoever defined, though Shri Bal Thackeray has belatedly acknowledged Amitabh Bachchan'sgreat contribution to Mumbai, Maharashtra and India.
But it is time Raj Thackeray'shate-mongering is checked in time before it does irreparable damage to India'sessential unity. Mumbai needs sweat labour which the Marathi manus cannot adequately provide, but a Bihari unemployed can. Structural Mumbai was built mostly by labour from distant places and Mumbai should be eternally grateful to their contribution. It is doing no favour to the Marathi manus by banning the entry to Bihari or Uttar Pradeshi labour, apart from its being anti-national and meriting harsh jail sentence. India is One and Indivisible. Indians of all castes, religions and linguistic affiliations depend on each other and have been doing so for ages. Raj Thackeray should be made aware of it. It is time for all political parties to act unitedly against disruptive forces such as have been unleashed by the MNS, and Sharad Pawar has already shown a willingness to do so. Mumbai is the capital of Maharashtra but it was built through the blood and sweat of people from all over India, a truth which must be dinned into the ears of Raj Thackeray. Amitabh Bachchan owes no apology to the MNS or to Shiv Sena. His brand name itself is the biggest contribution he could make not just to Mumbai but to Maharashtra and to India. The MNS must be grateful to Bachchan and to the thousands and millions from outside Mumbai who had made it their home and have given the city their varied labour. Not to do so is to insult Maharastra'sgreat leaders like Gopala Krishna Gokhale, Bal Gangadhar Tilak not to speak of the one and only Chhatrapathi Shivaji himself, the greatest nationalist of all.
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