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Vandalism of Indian national pride by a small regional party

by sasidharannair | November 9, 2009 at 10:47 am

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Mumbai: While the new members of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly were being sworn in on Monday at Mantralaya in Mumbai, Raj Thackeray's Maharashtra Nava Nirman Sena (MNS) party MLAs pounced on Samajwadi Party leader and MLA Abu Azmi and attacked him. What provoked them was Abu Azmi was taking the oath office secrecy in Hindi.

MNS MLAs pulled the microphone and stopped Abu Azmi for taking the oath of office secrecy in Hindi claiming that it was the insult to Marathi pride. The tussle did not end there with other MNS legislators joining in and shouting slogans against Azmi. Ram Kadam and Shishir Kunde even exchanged blows with Azmi, with Kadam seen live on television slapping and hitting him on the chest and shoulders.

What had embarrassed an entire country was the matter of great pride for Raj Thackeray and his men. Raj Thackerary's gang, and it was that in every sense of the word, proudly said "it's a fitting reply".

According to the Constitution of India, any elected member of legislative can take oath in any one of the officially recognized 15 languages, national language Hindi or English.

Backed by a unanimous condemnation of the violence, the Speaker has suspended four MNS MLAs for four years: Shishir Shinde from Bhandup West; Ram Kadam from Ghatkopar West; Vasant Geete from Nashik Central; and Ramesh Vanzale from Kahdakvasla. But the MNS remains unrepentant, satisfied that the violent politics of chauvinism has planted the party in the news again.

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Mritunjay

at 11:53 on November 9th, 2009

This type of hooliganism is not new from this band of politicians. Its a shame to the constitution and the Fundamental rights it guarantees to its citizens of free speech and choice of language. Abu Azmi was taking oath in the National Language of the country which did not go well with the the so-called politicians.

The same political party had issues with people from two Indian states working in the state. So what they expect: People should have visa d language training before coming to the financial capital of India?!

This is nothing new from the family of the founder of this party: Raj Thackrey.

The patriarch of the family: Bal Thackrey ran a similar campaign against people from Southern states in his early days. Now the nephew after being kicked from the original party is running smae test with people from North India as lab rats.

Shame on such people.

sasidharannair

at 12:07 on November 9th, 2009

Thank you for your comment.

Please visit the link http://www.sunnynewsonline.com/news4.html to read my article written one year back about Maharasshtra Navanirman Sena.

Mritunjay

at 12:46 on November 9th, 2009

Good work. The self perceived "success" that MNS believes it has received using its lopsided language politics in the assembly elections with 13 MLAs in a house of 288 seems to have added the proverbial wings to the ant. They have "upgraded" from manhandling poor daily wage earners on the streets to democratically elected MLAs.

Let’s hope the voters do not suffer from short term memory that we typically see and remember these actions.

Thanks once again for the nice article.

sasidharannair

at 12:55 on November 9th, 2009

You are welcome.

You may visit the link http://www.dancewithshadows.com/politics/shobhaa-de-on-raj-thackeray-mns-and-maharashtra/ to read the article based on the TV interview of Shobhaa De on Raj Thakerary, MNS and Maharashtra by Karan Thaper and the comments.