Jai Maharashtra, maane Jai Bharat!

As the title indicates, this post is to encourage Raj Thackeray to put the Bhaiyyas in their place! If you think I'm kidding, I'm not. There are two aspects to the latest Maharashtrians vs North-Indians debate. How should outsiders behave in their adopted city? And the importance of having regional parties.

To begin with, all cities must be open to outsiders and make them feel welcome. Its business, stupid! Migrants only come to places that are growing and these newcomers invariably enhance that growth. But there is a catch. Cities expect these people to GET OUT after-a-while. Come, show us your trade, make a buck and get the hell out!

But that neat model doesn't always work. Its natural that people would like to settle in their new enriched place. Fair enough! But how can you call your new place home, without even speaking the local language, let alone celebrating the local culture? And what on hell are you doing bringing your local politicians here?

Five decades ago, it was only some 'lunatic tamil chauvinists' like me who stopped Hindi, if not the Hindiwallahs from bullying their way in. Shivsena soon joined and made us, the lungiwallahs behave. But the Sena could not go beyond the Mumbai/Thane area and ended up as a moronic muslim killers party. Worse its sucking up to the north-indians now! If Raj Thackeray can take the only good-thing about Shivsena, the Mee Marathi rhetoric, we can happily bid farewell to that senile Tiger and his puppy.

People who find regionalism or 'linguistic chauvinism' in all this, simply fail to the see the bigger picture. None of India's coastal states speak Hindi. And except Bengal (which has been ruined by the zamindari CPM) and Orissa, rest of the coastal states are doing very well. Across the world, coasts flourish. So each of these states will at some point come under pressure from migrants. Simply throwing our doors open to everyone will have disastrous consequences.

If the northies simply migrate to the 'G8 states' who on hell will fix the mess in the BiMaRU states? For example, why should Hindi movies be made in Mumbai, when its the Muslims from UP and the Bhojpuris who depend on it financially? Why don't they make Khan movies in Meerut and Bachchan movies in Gorakhpur? Those goddawful places will get much needed employment and Maharashtra may even be able to revive its stone-dead Marathi movie industry.

This country needs more regionalism not less. Even a Narendra Modi finds Gujarati Asmita vs Delhi Durbar more salable than Mian Musharraf. If Telugu Desam party had actually united the Desam in development, there would have been no need for a Telangana. If Hegde had created a meaningful Kannadiga party, Karnataka's politics would not have become such a laughing stock today.

The ideal political scenario for India would be to have three national parties (Congress, BJP and CPM) and a virulent regional party in every state. Let us celebrate the most important feature of India, its diversity. But celebrating is not, me cleaning your mess.