Mumbai vs Bombay: We The People - NDTV

It was really sad to see the kind of discussion that was going on, on the show. It seemed that Bombay (yes, it sounds really awesome) was a city in Peter Pan's wonderland where Alice and for that matter, Batman could also reside. I could not see anything being said for development of the city that Bombay is. We talk about making Bombay a world-class city. Where, may I ask, is the will to pursue that dream? It surely is not a concrete idea, just a dream.I understand that we, the Indians, would put Don Quixote to shame, given the chance. But bickering about what name a city should have, what kind of people can live in the city and what rights must they have, would not get us anywhere. Going by what I have said, ghettoisation, if not annihilation (how Raj would have wished for it), is what this would lead to.
A labourer from eastern UP or Bihar leaves his home to find a job in a city where the natives consider it demeaning to perform hard labour. The high-rises that Bombay's skyline is witness to, have the 'migrant's' sweat plastered all over them.I would draw a parallel to the situation in Bihar in times of Lalu Prasad Yadav with the current political situation in Maharashtra. Lalu Prasad Yadav realised, quite cunningly though, that as long as the average voter is illiterate and intellectually challenged, they will vote for theatrics and aura. On a similar note, the Shiv Sena and the MNS (Congress enjoying the spoils from the side-line) are stoking fire that exists due to incompetence, to a certain extent, of the native Maharashtrian. It is easy to add fuel to fire by raking up regional jingoism, but it doesn't change the situation on the ground. You tell a person that they will get a job, although not qualified for that job, if they beat up migrants. Why in the whole wide world would they make an effort to improve upon their skills?

At the end of the day, Raj Thackeray has to travel on Bombay's roads in his SUV with his English medium educated children conversing in German. But this is nothing new. We have seen such things earlier, and we would continue to see them in the future as well. But one thing has stood the test of time across the world. A migrant would work twice as efficiently as a native because he has to build a life in the new environment. A migrant is the pillar on whose shoulders great cities and nations have been built and would continue to be built. People like Raj Thackeray would just give an impetus to move the business and life out of a city to another city. That would be the zenith of their existence and sadly, the death of the city that was once alive.
http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/new/NDTV-Show-Special.aspx?ID=384

The Maoist Issue

The television screens have scorched and the newspapers bled in ink with the 'Maoist Menace' that has gripped the Indian state as a whole and West Bengal in particular. There has been widespread violence and the Maoists have shown that they are tough customers to deal with.

Their plank for this bloody agitation and revolution is that the Indian state has failed its people in deep forests that are inhabited by the tribals. This surely is a dark reality that the state machinery has been made to come face-to-face with. But the question is : What would be achieved by taking the path of violence?

A little introspection into the modus operandi of the Maoist 'revolutionaries' would show that ideology and practice are two poles apart for them. They might swear by the Communist ideology, but they also swear by the campaign of terror and bloodshed.

Who is to blame for this situation?

The Indian Union has distinctly divided affairs of the state in the State List, that encompasses the duties of individual state governments, and the Central List, which encompasses the key responsibility areas of the Central Government.

The West Bengal government falls flat on counts of no development and pathetic living conditions that have existed in these tribal areas for long. The development of these areas is the responsibility of the state government and with 32 years of rule, if the WB government can't provide even basic sanitation to the natives, their moral right to continue in office ceases to exist.

Are there any alternatives?

There don't seem to be, at least any viable ones. The arch rival of the rulers of WB is the Trinamool Congress. This party is headed by a woman by the name of Mamata Bannerjee. She also happens to be the Railway Minister at the Centre. It is a strange situation that the people of WB would be confronted with in the upcoming assembly elections. On one side is a government that has done its best to retain WB in a time warp where that last 32 years have just gone by, without any one's knowledge.

On the other side is TC, whose leader swears by anti-SEZ ideas. She seems completely bankrupt when it comes to ideas about development issues and poverty alleviation, just like the incumbents.

But I guess Didi, as Mamata Banerjee is called by her followers, would bring TC to power in WB in the coming assembly elections. The electorate have seen the worst. For them any change would be for the good, as the worst is what they are living in.

Oh, and the question of the Maoists. The Central government has declared them as a terrorist organization. They enjoy the same status as that of LeT and LTTE. The rulers of WB have, surprisingly, voiced their concerns against this action. Talk about proactively quashing peace!

Mr. Raj 'Zealot' Thackeray

A few days back I was watching a CBS documentary, 'Hitler - The Rise of Evil'. I was astonished by the anger and hate he had against the Jews. He would spit venom against the Jews whenever he got the chance to. The reason stated was : The Jews were taking away all the jobs and contaminating the social scene in Germany.
But to draw analogies would be wrong, even excessively stupid in terms of current affairs in India.

Mr. Thackeray is a zealot. A person presumably very driven by the love for Maharashtra and its people and its language. Its a different story altogether that his kids would not even dare to study in a native language medium school (marathi medium school in this case). But that can be forgiven, because the next generation of netas has to be above the masses, then only would they be netas, right?

So Mr. Thackeray has taken a liking to blast anything and everything that is remotely related to UP and Bihar. He states that the people from other states are different, because they are also nourishing anti UP-Bihar sentiments. If the 'messiah' of the masses just throws a glance to the progress that HIS ( It is the state of a billion people, called Indians, which the messiah has somehow forgot ) state has made, it is because of the cheap labor that the Eastern UP and Bihar belt provides in terms of factory workers and laborers. It is very easy to rouse the sentiments of a populace which is more than ready to bash anyone who is doing better that them financially and socially.
The sad thing is that this feeling of xenophobia is being bred into the blood of the people at the grass root level. They are being lured to a theory which is far moved from the realities of life. Roti. Kapda. Makaan.
Never in any of his venomous speeches, has Mr. Thackeray mentioned even a word about development or the measures that he would take in order to make the lives better of the people who were listening to him. All he does is spew venom and garner applause.
The people of Maharashtra should be proud of the legacy that they have. Shivaji is revered not only in Maharashtra, but the world over. The people need to realise that they belong to a country...INDIA. The allegiance that they have, should be first to the country and then to the state.
By instigating violence against the 'migrants' and driving them away from their workplaces would be a step further towards disintegration of the country. Who would need Pakistan or Bangladesh when we have our own brigade of people who are out to divide the country from within! The enemies of the nation would just sip on a cold beer and bask in the stupidity of the Indians.

The Marathis are learned people and hold high posts in academic institutions like IITs and in corporate world. They value education. What if each and every one of them is driven out from their place of dwelling and sent to Maharashtra?
And Mr Thackeray has got problems with 'migrant students' coming to the colleges in Pune! If this is not a propensity towards 'showing the finger' to the very basic founding principles of the Indian society and the Indian Republic, then what is it? Reminds me of Partition!
I fail to understand why people want to create enmity and differences between otherwise peacefully coexisting communities? For a few votes? That's it?

Sardar Patel would have chosen to relinquish his Indian citizenship, rather than being called a citizen of a country where the rule book is thrown into the bin and spit upon such blatantly!