KISKI
HAI MUMBAI!
I feel saddened today when on a death of a Party Leader the city is “Bandh”. Neither was he Chief Minister of the state any point, nor was he a freedom fighter for this undeclared “Bandh”. It was a natural death and not an assassination! All the Non-Maharastrians are made to feel like they don’t respect the sentiments of the locals and should leave Mumbai and go back to their own states. I ask this question who makes the local of a city.
Who is REALLY a localite of Mumbai? Someone who has been born and lived here for 30 years? Or Who has worked in this city for 30 years? Or Who works hard enough to earn his livelihood to help run the city smoothly by driving be it rickshaws, autos or sells you your daily supplies. Or the Dosa and Vada Pav sellers ensuring cheap n tasty food? Or is it of those who claim Mumbai is theirs and break law and order, just because they can speak better Marathi than I can?
I feel saddened today when on a death of a Party Leader the city is “Bandh”. Neither was he Chief Minister of the state any point, nor was he a freedom fighter for this undeclared “Bandh”. It was a natural death and not an assassination! All the Non-Maharastrians are made to feel like they don’t respect the sentiments of the locals and should leave Mumbai and go back to their own states. I ask this question who makes the local of a city.
Who is REALLY a localite of Mumbai? Someone who has been born and lived here for 30 years? Or Who has worked in this city for 30 years? Or Who works hard enough to earn his livelihood to help run the city smoothly by driving be it rickshaws, autos or sells you your daily supplies. Or the Dosa and Vada Pav sellers ensuring cheap n tasty food? Or is it of those who claim Mumbai is theirs and break law and order, just because they can speak better Marathi than I can?
When I go to Tamil Nadu, they bearly talk in Hindi or English but they don’t ask me to get out of the state. When I go to Gujarat, they understand my language and respond, when I go to Bengal I can openly talk about left parties and mamta didi, no one will kill me/throw me out. Cause they are tolerant states. Various Govt. have non violence policies to save the interests of the localites. When I go to New York, it gives me a feeling that this is what my Mumbai was. Welcomed all, different cultures, different languages, different foods, but still a place which would never question my identity. But that doesn’t mean I can’t say that America is anti-Islamic, but just the tolerance of American is far more civilized. So be it any part of the country/world, I feel first an Indian and that’s what they recognize me as. So why in my own country I feel the need to justify whether I am a Indian/Mumbaikar or a global citizen. Why can’t I just be accepted as a human.
I know some of my friends don’t agree with me, Well I also don’t agree with them. Some of my friends say you are stupid to express yourself so openly. I say life is about saying what you believe in is truth and humanity.
I dint distinguish when I go to teach in a small adivasi school; where all the kids are Maharastrian, run by a North Indian. To do good people don’t differentiate by caste/language. They differentiate only when they have to do BAD. Also, people are remembered for their bad more than any good they ever did.
You can’t demand respect from me, everyone has to earn it. Leader is a person who works in the interest of Nation, rest all are politicians.
I have never heard any Indian say Jai Tamil/Jai Karnataka/Jai Bengal, then why say Jai Maharashtra? I was taught only JAI HIND!
