Mumbai, city of open arms, turns hostile

[Gregory Hewett]

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[julie]

Mumbai, city of open arms, turns hostile.

After reading this article, I was shocked. I was not aware of this issue in Mumbai. I was really surprised to find out what was happening. I do not understand why all this violence is happening, why do people beat and kill each other because of their nationality, why is this discrimination happening.

This discrimination in Mumbai is happening especially against people from North India; why them? The government, or more especially Thackeray, a nationalist politician, thinks that the immigrants steel the citizen’s jobs and destructed their culture.
Why were the people more tolerant in the past? Is it because of the government? Is the government controlling people’s mentality?

Thackeray thinks that immigrants in Mumbai are something negative. However, I did some research on the internet and found that not everybody thinks that way. "Mumbai still depends on these workers from North India for such services. Today in Mumbai, there are at least 48 services that are provided only by these North Indians," said Sanjay Nirupam studying Indian mythology to prove that North India is important for Mumbai (Yahoo India News).

The problem of these mentalities and these cruel aggressions is that it often stops development and modernization.

[nitika]

Many rich people had gathered at the racecourse in Mumbai for the Indian Derby. When the event was over and as many of them were coming back to the suburbs on the afternoon of February 3, they were stuck in traffic as a politician named Raj Thackeray had sent many people to beat up migrants residing in Mumbai.
Many people from all different religions and cultures live in Mumbai. It is one of the most cosmopolitan places in South Asia. It is the home to famous actors such as Amitabh Bachan and Rekha as well as the richest man in the world, Mukesh Ambani, and probably the poorest man in India.
In past years many people have been driven out of Mumbai since they have supposedly offended Mumbai’s culture. Now politicians want to rid Mumbai of migrants because they can’t speak Marathi and they don’t adopt Marathian culture. Therefore, these politicians think they are preserving Marathian culture, people, and language by ridding Mumbai of migrants. Instead of encouraging immigration, these politicians are narrow- minded and are living in the past.
Raj Thackeray’s decision to rid Mumbai of migrants is supported by some young, underemployed people who call themselves “sons of the soil”. They feel that the migrants get jobs that they want and they also feel that migrants are changing Maharashtrian culture completely.
Many famous people such as M.F Hussain, Salman Rushdie, Sania Mirza don’t reside in India as they feel that their security in their own country is not enough. Religious Hindu leaders have filed court cases against M.F Hussain as they are aghast by his nude depictions of many gods. Many activists have objected to Sania Mirza’s short skirts that she wears during competitions.
The movie “The Da Vinci Code” was banned in many states in India as it offended the small Christian minority, even though it was played in other Christian countries all over the world.
This shows how the people in India are becoming more narrow- minded than ever.
I think that in the future, these politicians will continue these attacks and rid Mumbai of migrants. I also think that many people all around India will lash out against these politicians and it will become a huge concern, since it is stated in the Indian constitution that citizens of India may reside any where in India freely.
To stop these attacks, the Indian government should get involved immediately, arrest Raj Thackeray and put a stop to these attacks, instead of discussing how short Sania Mirza’s skirt is.
This event is shocking since I thought politicians are open-minded and encourage a healthy amount of immigration.
This event affects all the people in Mumbai. The migrants especially since they are getting hurt for no reason, as they are not doing anything wrong or illegal. Many jobs will be lost.
I don’t understand why Raj Thackeray wants to rid Mumbai of immigrants. Isn’t India a free country? How are immigrants ruining Maharashtrian culture?

[jozefien]

The title of this article “Mumbai City of Open Arms, Turns Hostile” gives a perfect view of what is happening nowadays in Mumbai. Of all cities in India, I always believed that Mumbai was the freest and most “Western”. Inspired by stories of other people, I thought that in Mumbai the people are less conservative and traditional than in other parts of India, however after reading this article my opinion changed completely.

The article is basically about the fact that recently a rightist politician, Raj Thackeray and his followers have spread very intolerant ideas about migrants from North India. He claims that they decrease the local wages and are not willing to learn the local language, Marathi. This has resulted in many incidents: North Indian taxi drivers and street vendors were beaten up, a cinema with movies from the North was attacked, and the bungalow of a North-Indian movie-star was damaged with glass bottles. Although the Thackeray and his party pretend that they are not involved in these violent actions, there ideas are certainly on the root of it.

The intolerance is not only expressed with violence but also with discrimination. Some upper-class Hindus have declared that entire regions in Mumbai have become vegetarian. This means that Muslims who live there are no longer able to sell or buy meat in their direct environment. I think that in the future this will cause many (North-Indian/ Muslim) restaurants and shops that serve /sell meat to go bankrupt. The intention of the people who declared whole neighborhoods vegetarian is probably to make the migrants from the North go back to their own region. However, I don’t think that this will happen since many North-Indians have lived a long time in Mumbai and some are even born there. A more probable effect of the vegetarian zones in Mumbai is that the Muslims will all move to the remaining non-veg. parts of the city. This can result in areas with huge populations of migrants, which will decrease the integrating of those migrants in the Mumbai culture and cause even more intolerance.

Another trend in Mumbai is to exile artists who make a statement against the Indian/ Mumbai traditions. Also other forms of art such as films and exhibitions that “offend” their culture are banned. Since some famous artists and persons are no longer allowed to use their own opinions and visions in their art or to practice their normal jobs, they have decided to move abroad, away from Mumbai’s narrow-minded culture. Examples of such people are M.F. Hussain, a painter who moved because his paintings of naked Hindu goddesses were considered as offending and Sanja Mirza, India’s best tennis player who doesn’t play in India because her short skirts are not accepted.
The fact that Indian citizens are scared to live in their own city means a lot. Although Mumbai likes to profile itself as a city that is open to new ideas, acting like this shows that it is still very traditional and that it can not be considered as a cosmopolitan city yet.

After reading the article I wondered why it only mentioned Muslims and North-Indians. I can imagine that there are a lot of immigrants from other countries as well, so why is the violence only addressed to the North-Indians? It is actually very weird because the North-Indians and the people in Mumbai are all Indian citizens. Actually, I would expect that it is more likely that people are intolerant towards people of other nationalities than people of the same country. Another question that came to my mind is: “Does discrimination/intolerance against people of the same nationality occur in other countries and other cities as well, or does this only happen because India is such a big and diverse country?”

[sarah99]

Starting on February 3rd, local political cadres under the rightist politician Raj Thackeray were beating up local migrants from Northern India because of the way these migrants are “strangling their culture” and “depressing their wages”. Mumbai has been known as a “city of open arms” because of the diversity of its people: Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Christians…. However in recent years, Mumbai has become to turn hostile. Other than hostility towards migrants, some factions of people living in Mumbai have been hostile towards Muslims, artists, women athletes, and anything relating to the North of India, for example, the movies of Northern India.

I was very surprised about this because I would think that because of the diversity of India in general that the Indian people would have learned to live together peacefully a long time ago. The people of Mumbai need to learn how to live together peacefully. As a result, most people will be happier, if not all. I think that they will feel at peace and happier if they are not in a conflict. Why live in conflict? How does it benefit anyone involved??

I think that as a result of this, the people of Mumbai will live in a frightening environment , unless they learn to live together despite different backgrounds. The people of Mumbai need to learn to think of the other person, and not live so selfishly.

[zachghaderi]

This article is completely mind blowing. I honestly can’t believe that this is actually taking place. It reminds me of an episode of Numb3rs where they killed a guy at a horse race…..anyway. The reasoning for these actions is completely insane. They are afraid that they will loose their culture? Look at Singapore, they have tons of cultures, races, ethnic backgrounds, etc. all piled into one and they live in peace and harmony with each other. There are never any hate crimes against different races and such. The immigrants going to Mumbai is only going to help the economy. That is one of the major themes of the book that we recently finished, that immigration is a good thing for the receiving country. I honestly can’t see why any South Asian country wouldn’t want immigrants.

They have completely brain washed the young adults of Mumbai. They have their little “sons of the soil” group that can only led to assume that they are practicing their deluded violent rants towards their false impressions sthingy fed to them to hate their neighbors. What kind of world is this!? I honestly don’t get it.

It is amazing to me how people get dragged into this. It is the painters, sports players, and movie stars that have no real part in the matter but have masses of people hating their every move. Famous paintings from all over the world and throughout history depict nude scenes. It is just glorifying the design of the human body. The shorts that female tennis players where are not sinful and guilty, they are only the formal uniform of the sport and allow full comfort to play at the peak of said players abilities. As for the movies, why must you shut down the movie in a certain area because if is offensive. If it is really so sinful…don’t go see it. No one is forcing anyone to attribute to the box office.

This entire this is completely lame. The fact that the world just can’t get along is just lame. It is so saddening.

Peace…and good night
Zach

[zachghaderi]

They have their little “sons of the soil” group that can only led to assume that they are practicing their deluded violent rants towards their false impressions sthingy fed to them to hate their neighbors.

there wasa typo...this is real sentence...

[zachghaderi]

wat the heck... it did it again.
mr. hewett ur discussion forum is messed up.

..false impressions "sthingy" "fed" to them...

[zachghaderi]

s.p.o.o.n. fed

[olivia]

Mumbai, city of open arms, turns hostile.

This article was really shocking. Its so mind blowing to realize that this sort of violence is taking place in the streets of local communities. Why is this happening?

This violence is to blame for mumbai's recent discrimination and beatings against immigrants from northern India, setteling in this hostile city and even there own local citizens. This violence has been caused over many issues, such as the dress code of national athletes to even movies supposed to be offending the christian community.
A polital leader Thackeray, blames immigrants for stealing local jobs, distrupting, and more so offending their culture.

What i dont understand, is why Mumbai was more tolerant of these immigrants in the past and now more intolerant. Shouldnt communities be aiming for a more diverse, ethnic, and cultural group? Its quite devastating to realize that these people have used violence to control their on personal beliefs and opinions. Its a harsh reality, how a group of people strive to keep their personal diversities in control, and rather than trying to accept others, they block them out completely by using inhumane physical violence. Is this the way civilization was suppposed to turn out? or is this just a hickup? hopefully, this is the case, and these brutal attacks will be stopped, but from what has been seen, it doenst look good, and doesnt shed good light on Mumbai, it goverment and governmental leaders.

[keisuke]

WOW!! this article is one of the most saddest article i ever read in this discusstion forums. i never thought that peope would hate each other like this. i mean we are all same humas just have different belifes and different pasts. As many people would think i would want to know why do these people wont accept immigrants in the first place. they are there to help their countires or their economy not to ruin them.

Questions:
1.why do these people immigrants this way?

Predictions:
i would think that they would have some kind of debate on these cases in one of these years since we can not leave these kind of things beghind.

[tamsin]

this was a quite astonishing read. Its hard to believe the way humanity has turned out, expecially in these circiumstances.

The government of Mumbai, and its political leader Thackeray, have blamed immigrants from North India for taking away local jobs from local citizens and have blamed them for altering thier culture. Because of these reasons, there have been violent raids through out Mumbai. This is also an issue for local Mumbai citizens. National athletes have been victimized for their dress code, and movies such as the Da Vinci Code have been banned in certain areas because it has supposidly upset the christian and catholic community, where as, it has been screened in many christian communities through out the world.

In the past, Mumbai was much more tolerant of Immigrants, but why now have they enforced such cruel behaviour in order to keep there own opinons and beliefs heard? Mumbai should be welcoming in imigrants instead of beating them up, and throwing them back. Its very sad that the goverment has turned to violence to make thier objectives firmily understood. Instead of trying to grow their economy, they are stunting it, and it is not the way a large city like Mumbai should be aiming for. I am not sure whether these violent rampaids are just temporary, or are going to be on going incidents through out the future, but if this is the case, the Mumbai government better stop this injustice before a catastrophe develops, and turns an aready bad situation, into an even worse one.

[priyankajohn]

It is a pity sad that this is what the world is coming to, hurting people for no valuable reasons. There is no value for human life....specially the under privileged. According to Mr. Thackeray Mumbai is only for Maharashtra’s and he wants all the north Indians who had come there to make a living out of the state. The poor people who had come and settled here to make a living are now being targeted and 0 tortured and some even killed. He has created an image and a political party for himself and by brain washing the local Maharashtrians, mostly the not so educated class to follow him so that he can get popular. With a result of this there are a lot of riots. He and his followers do not seem to be affected by the pain and suffering innocent people are going through.
This is ridiculous. Bombay was always a very welcoming state for people of all caste and creed and for people from different states to come and settle down and make a living. Being a cosmopolitan city people were so happy and comfortable living there. Now things have started changing. People are being threatened to leave the State because they are not Marathi’s and that if they have to live there they have to learn Marathi and live like a Marathi etc.

[sparsh]

On February 3rd the politician Raj Thackeray and his party of followers started beating up North Indians. They beat up the taxi drivers; they went and attacked movie theatres that were playing north Indian movies. The worst part is that they had attacked Amithabh Bachan’s house. Amithabh Bachan is the most respected actor in all of India, he is known globally. Mumbai is known to be the city with open arms. A city with is full of Christians, Hindus, Jews and Muslims. They hate on the North Indians because they think that the north Indians are stealing their jobs. Sound familiar?

I was very shocked when I read this article. It is for the first time I have read that a bunch of Indians want to be diversified from other Indians just because of the region their states are in. So what if the North Indians don’t learn Marathi, the national language is Hindi. As long as they speak Hindi there should be no problem. In my opinion all of these politicians are so corrupt and the only way to sort something is to start a fight or a riot. This is wrong. Mahatma Gandhi made this nation free for peace and non violence but politicians like Raj Thackeray is doing the exact opposite. Hopefully some politician who has more power will stop this madness. That is the best for the country. Raj Thackeray has to understand that Mumbai is like the New York or Los Angeles of India. It is full of the stars of India. All of the important people live there and so he can’t kick out a bunch of people just because they are from the north. He should just get use to it because violent is not going to make things better. It will just make things worse.

[rmanu]

After reading this article i thought people in Mumbai were crazy. The North Indians are targeted because the politic an leader does not want the culture of Maharashtra to get destroyed so he is beating up immigrants from Northern India. I do not think there is a reason to beat up the North Indians because i do not think that the culture will get destroyed because of North Indians migrating into Mumbai. Thackeray a nationalist politician is doing all this because he wants to prove that if more and more migrants from the northern states come into Mumbai they will speak in their language therefore he is beating up people. Gautama Adhara, Editor of the influential times of India newspaper says that "it is difficult to create a modern, urban society." I think that he is right because if this rampage continues and the politician stop migrants from coming into Mamba it will be very difficult for Mamba develop and this will affect India because Mamba is one of the main cities in India.

[niranthara]

Mumbai is a "cosmopolitan" city in India known for its multicultural atmosphere and liberal nature. Mainly because of the international industries within the city, cultures have mingled and been exchanged. Usually one refers to it as a developing city because of it’s acceptance towards immigrants and their respective cultures from all over the world. lattely this progressive state had sown a very different side of itself.

recently a very conservative party, lead by Raj Thackeray, has shown that it is very protective of Mumbai’s culture. On the 3rd of febuary, afew of its members assaulted immigrants from the northern parts of India, saying that they were “strangling the culture,” and invading the solidarity within the city. But the truth is that the only ones disturbing the unity within the city were the members of this conservative party themselves. The northern immigrants were also accused of stealing jobs away from the natives and decreasing their wages, which isn’t completely untrue. Many of the natives, scared of being punished for their actions, have begun to follow the rules of their culture and religion very meticulously. For example many citizens have become vegetarian and are avoiding any connection with Muslims and others of unaccepted cultures. Many celebrities who have “criticised” or depicted this marahti culture in the way they see it have been forced to leave the country for their own good. These revolutionists have created a very hostile environment in Mumbai.

Culture can make and break.
Culture plays such a big role because ethnicity is what defines who the people are. The culture that the people take on explains the approaches and methods of life that they follow, and therefore the changes they will take in the future. At the same time, it could be a burden as it alludes that the country needs to find methods of development and simple ways of life different from the rest of the world as it may not suite its culture. It even stops development at some places because the behaviour of the people may not agree with the extent of change that the nation is going through. On the other hand, it also stabilizes the country as culture helps the people to become stronger as individuals and as a community. It also shows a sign of solidarity.

Is Raj Thackeray trying to protect Mumbai’s identity, or is he just trying to show his authority over the people of Mumbai? What caused this conservative party to act the way it has?
I guess one could say that the extremely multicultural atmosphere didn’t allow any unity with the people. At the same time, the culture that was being followed was completely different from the culture that Mumbai called its own. The sense of solidarity was lost among the people because there was nothing to hold them together.

Today people are restricting themselves from eating non-vegetarian food and acting westernized, but once every thing calms down, will the people remain the way there are or will they continue to westernize themselves?

If Mumbai’s culture is strong enough it will force itself on the people, but not accepting any western methods of life will stunt the development. After all development is about adapting methods of life that are productive and using it to suite your own environment. What Mumbai needs right now is to be able to accept the different cultures and ethics of the world and at the same time adapt it so that it suites its own environment. Mumbai should be able to glocalize.
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[jungkyu]

This was a shocking article. People in Mumbai cannot and must not just be beaten up from Maharashtran people. They should not be influenced by the Hindu nationalist politician, Thackeray, who has a distorted views towards migrants. Why should he state his false opinion and spread his ideas to the innocent young, and underemployed people? The biggest question I had for this was that what was the driving force of a one man which affects the others, resulting them to assimilate and absorb that one man's idea? It was in a sense ironical, confusing, but most of all, shocking. Why should the targets be the people in Mumbai? Was it because of the fact that Mumbai was the city of open arms? If so, this incident may repeat in other cities, not just in India, but other cities with the open arms. What will happen to the innocent migrants? Why are they affected because of a one man's word? The reality is that these migrants are just a victim.
This article was basically about people in Mumbai, being affected by Thackerary, a Hindu nationalist politican. He had made a statement that northern people should adopt the culture of Maharashtra State. He mentions that these Indian migrants are depressing the wages of Maharashtran people, and strangling their culture. Consequently, it had appealed to some young, underemployed people, and made many young party activist in Thackerary's party to take this statement to heart. Another summary of this article was about this incident had pressured a painter, and the highest ranked tennis player.
To look at this astonishing incident, we need to understand that the more a city is open the culture, the more unpredictable of what may happen. Furthermore, a person cannot know the truth unless they experience it. In this case, the people who are affected by Thackeraray cannot know weather the people from the north affects their wages and their culture.
It is obvious and predicable that the people from northern India will temporariliy decrease in number of migrating to Mumbai. However, there cannot be a possibility of cultural change in Mumbai. Furthermore, this may be ceased by the other politicians, who opposes to Thackeraray's viewpoint.

[kwangsampark]

This particular article is about people opposing to letting in migrants and other new generative things such as films, culture, etc.

Untill I read this article, I kind of thought that Mumbai was at least free and most modernized, also thought was a city thatwas not based on traditions. However, after reading this article, I realized that what I thought was wrong.

A lot of people are getting affected by the problem. Migrants and other people who are trying to be modernized or who are trying to bring new stuffs in, they are getting beaten up. Or, they are filed with court cases.

The article gave an exmaple of an artist named Husain. He is an Indian but he lives in Dubai. The reason to this is because he was filed with so many court cases due to his draing. He was files with cases just by drawing a nude depictions of Hindu goddesses. It is not only the paintings that have been banned. A lot of films were also banned.

The movie "The Da Vinci Code" is the example. Because it had offended a tiny Christian minority, it was banned from being imported. Numerous problems occur beside these. Although the city Mumbai has opened its arms, there is a crush between its tradition of liberty and new generations.

One editor worries that it will be hard to create an urban society unless people get the idea of live and let live.

After reading this article, few(two) questions came in my mind. The first question was why would people not want to let in new things. The second question is if the people are not letting in new things and the immigrants are getting beaten up, then is there any policies that protect immigrants?

These are the two questions. If people let in new things and modernize he city, people of the city would benefit. But why don't they accept new things? I know that it is important to keep their own traditions however, it is not good to be just in a boundary. As time flows, globalization will be something that is common. And if there are countries like this city Mumbai, they would have hard time going along with others.

So what I suggest is, to accept the new things, but at the same time protect thier traditional things. The answer to second question is "I don't know." I think that there will be some policies that protect immigrants.

To conclude, instead of people banning new generations, they should accept them and try to modernize so that it would benefit them more.

[elizabethw]

These article discuses about discrimination within the borders of a single nation this is even more dangerous than cross border discrimination based on religion, colour or race. Many immigrants today suffer discrimination when they are to a new country. No one should suffer discrimination in his or her own country. This article clearly shows that India’s tolerance is being challenged. The recent happenings in Mumbai show how the Marathis showed intolerance towards the north Indians by damaging properties of the north Indians.



There have also been other incidents in India where people have been threatened because of their religions or their geographical backgrounds even celebrities excluded important point to be noted here is while discriminating people there is no consideration for wealth, economy or social class- even celebrities are not immune to it. Mumbai is the economic hub of India any social disturbance like this will not only affect the people but also impact the economy of the nation

[xxlyra]

Drop the name "Bombay" in any conversation, and you will be sure to evoke images of a high-flying, fast-living, and diverse metropolis overflowing in just as many Bollywood lights as cultures. Bombay today is largely known as a centre for business and pleasure, and as India's most famous melting pot of nationalities, religions, and ways of living.

This is why, for the vast majority, the recent news of violent outbursts against North-Indians residing in Bombay has come as nothing but a complete shock. Especially the comments of one formerly very minor and unknown political figure, Raj Thackeray, has infuriated many, and unfortunately, he has gained incredible media exposure for this.

Thackeray is largely the one responsible for these outbursts, since his party members were the first ones to take him up on his word to send back workers from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. But to fully understand why this situation came to be, one must take a look at the man that sparked this violence closer and his reasons for doing so.

(/history nerd mode: on xD)

The Thackeray family is a family with a long history of politics. In fact, when South Indians residing in more northern parts of India were attacked forty years ago, it was Raj Thackeray's father himself, Bal Thackeray and his Shiv Sena party, that led the campaigns. Then, in 1968, it took several years before everything cooled down. No officials number exist on how many South Indians died, but it is certainly in the thousands. Is this something any of us wish to repeat? Of course not. But the Thackeray family's bigotry did not stop with Bal: when Raj and his cousin, Uddhav Thackeray, joined the party, the discriminative stance still stood strong, albeit in a milder form.

Then, when Uddhav Thackeray was appointed leader of Shiv Sena by Raj's father, the angry Raj left and founded his own party, the little-known Maharashtra Navnirman Sena. Since this party was much smaller and even less prominent than the Shiv Sena, R.T. needed publicity if he wanted seats in the next elections.

Adopting a much more aggresive attitude towards the problem, an extensive campaign was launched by the little party and as they gained increasing exposure and publicity, surprise surprise, the Shiv Sena did the same. And as the economical gap between states continue to grow, there is a possibility for politicians to hit where it will strike the hardest: in the hearts of the financially insecure.

The point of explaining this? It would have been somehow more genuine if these extremist comments were the actual opinion of these parties. But here, they are only devices for getting more votes and more publicity. It is, in short, attention-whoring; doing things for the attention it gets rather than the deed itself.

(end of history lesson, lål trold.)

So why did it work? Why did people listen, and consequently strike out? As mentioned before, it was a sore point as the economical gaps grew, and the richer states did not want poorer states to bring their economies down. Further more, a huge part of young men in Bombay are unemployed. Rather than blaming it on a lack of education, they attribute it to the non-Maharashtrians. And, seeing this as a huge voter market, these unemployed young men, the parties continue with their propaganda. In this aspect one could (politically uncorrect, as one usually is never permitted to do this) draw a parallel between Mr. Adolf Hitler and Raj Thackeray; just as Hitler used the Jews as post-Depression Germany's scapegoat, Raj uses the North-Indians as the unemployeds' scapegoat. The explanation sounds simple, but if it was the case for World War II, it can certainly be the case for these killings.

Why hasn't this violence been stopped yet?
In the day of Indira Gandhi, there would be no discussion: Air Force One GO GO GO! But, seeing as She is no longer around, one can only wonder if any other politician will show the courage and determination she would have showed in the situation: the overwhelming and shocking situation has been met with equally shocking inaction from the government. In a country where apparantly movies have been banned from just slightly offending minorities, brutal slaughters are overlooked. Raj Thackeray is a free man for ordering murderings, but Salman Rushdie cannot roam freely in his native country because he, again, slightly offended religious groups.

And how can this be? The government has done nothing to protect the high numbers of North Indians, and even less than nothing to nip the problem in the bud; even though section 153 of the IPC for inflammatory speeches and spreading of hatred clearly illegalises the actions he has carried out again and again, he still walks free. The media continue giving Raj Thackeray his publicity. And as long as he keep getting that, and his party's power keep increasing, who knows when he is going to stop, when the government apparently harbours no interest in doing that?

Next stop Bombay blood rush.

sources:
Outlook India article, "The pocket anarchist," Smruti Koppikar
Outlook India article, "The diaspora is inside," by Prem Shankar Jha
book, "shantaram," by Gregory David Roberts,
article, "Mumbai, city of open arms, turn hostile," Anand Giridharadas
article, "Intolerance rears its head in cosmopolitan Mumbai."

[sanjayvdasari]

Well, that's sad.
to be honest, even though im Indian, i didn't really know about this whole Bombay situation.
Scince i only had one day to read the article, it didn't eally have time to sink in.

The Thackeray family is one that has deep roots in the odd and twisted world of politics. They have been causing a lot of trouble lately along with something to do with the Bachans where Mr. Raj said something the Bachans didn't like.

The article discusses the discrimination inside one small city that usually was really lively and had lots of people from llts of other places most people didn't know about and etc etc.. it was basically about Raj thackeray saying that he wanted all migrants out and that he was totally against the people living in his beloved city, mumbai who were not Hindu (he said this indirectly).

The North Indians in Mumbai were being beaten up because they were North Indians. This shows the amount of discrimination that the Mumbai people have against theother people in their city just because of what some politician said.

The question i am trying to ask is basically why. did all the Mumbai people have this feeling of discriimination in them before, or did they just feel like beating people up because their political leader said so.

[asifhilal]

With discrimination happening these days, it is not shocking that such a thing would happen. However, it is still sad. North Indians are not the reasons for Mumbai’s problems. Almost all people opposing immigrants will state the argument that immigrants “steal jobs”. I found out that taxi drivers were beaten up because that they were north Indian. The people of Mumbai make it seem that the North Indians are snatching jobs from their hands, and that they have these high-class jobs. Probably, a person from Uttar Pradesh was poor, so he went to Mumbai to drive a taxi. He hasn’t done too much harm, but he gets beat up. North Indians actually do well for Mumbai. The other things north Indians were accused of was “taking away their culture”. But really, I thought Mumbai was a multicultural state. This a very sad thing, and conservative people have to think of the good that the North Indians bring, rather than the bad.

[hisu]

I think that this article was horrifying and scary. I thought if I were in Mumbai I could have been one of the victims of a beating. It was just horrifying to hear that one of the people who worked for the government, a politician, could encourage such behavior. I thought that the people who worked for the government were in charge of taking care of all the people living in the countries and being fair as possible. But yet, they are encouraging these violent and inhumane acts. It was just horrifying. I thought Mumbai was a totally different place than this. I thought that it was the most modernized part of India, but it seems that it is more of a part of India that is “obsessed” with traditions and beliefs. I also think that Mumbai is after reading this current event, “while thriving economically, is regressing culturally, obsessed with personal success and unmindful of civic ideals like “live and let live.”” What I want to know is why they are doing this. Does it make any sense to get angry at people just because they don’t know the local language? Everybody has a right to make their own choices and shouldn’t be controlled by the government or anyone. They all have a right to make their choices. If they decide to learn the local language it’s their choice. They shouldn’t be forced to anything. Especially I find using violence to force people to do things is just inhumane and stupid. Nobody ever does a good job if they are forced anyway. Also, the immigrants and North Indians help raise the “wages” since “wages” are higher there usually so they will bring their standards to Mumbai so it should not “depress” it but raise it. Since many people were arrested for this, people will start realizing what they are doing is wrong and they should stop and think for themselves if what they are doing is what they truly believe in “violence” I think the situation will get better, because demos always end and everything will be back to normal soon.