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Mumbaikar Lose As MNS Wins
Abhinandan Mishra
Maharashtra poll results along with the poll results in the other two states of Arunachal Pradesh and Haryana has come as a bad news for the BJP. And the saffron colour continues to lose its shine.
It must have been a happy day at work for people at 10 Janpath as the hard work finally paid off in Maharashtra. With the party gaining an absolute majority, one hopes that the party will be able to live up to the expectations of the common Indian living in Maharashtra.
But the disheartening news was about a goon party gaining more strength.
Maharashtra Navnirman Sena won in 13 seats in the state including 7 seats in Mumbai.
And there can be two ways of looking at the performance.
The first one has more to do with not reading too much into the party's win. As the seat where it won was not on the basis of the party tag but because of a careful thinking that went into while selecting the candidates. The candidates who won were not imported from outside. Most of them were active in their constituency for years and were earlier a part of Shiv Sena.
So to say that the brand MNS worked would be wrong.
The second way of looking at this is that whether Mumbai has accepted and
given its nod to the hooliganism way of politics that was carried out by MNS? And this question needs to carefully understood in the backdrop of the violence that MNS cadre carried out recently.
Infact none of the media post election talk show focussed on this aspect of MNS. Not much time back, this was the same party who held the whole state to ransom and ransacked the city and attacked anyone whom they thought was from north India.
Mumbai sure has a short memory.
Perhaps Mumbaikars forgot that when 26/11 happened none of the MNS goons or Mr Thackrey came forward to help. And those who died while tackling the situation where from all parts of the country, it was not a 'Me Mumbaikar' campaign at that time. And it was not just Mumbai who was glued into to the TV for news but the whole India
And it was not just Mumbai who felt frustrated for being so helpless and it was not just Mumbai who cried whenever a still body of an innocent "Indian" came out.
Try to remember; it was hardly 11 months back.
Anyone who saw Raj speaking before the media will agree that he has reached a new realm. The same old arrogance and lust for power was back in his eyes and in his voice as he dared people to perform Chaath Puja.
I thought that the MNS will be routed from the state but now realize that I was wrong. Might has again proved right.
Why do we point fingers at the illiterate class when they elect criminals to power? Don't we say that the poor class doesn't have the "intellectual" capability to decide between right and wrong?
What happened to the not so intellectually backward class of Mumbai? Those who voted MNS to power how are they going to justify it?
Is violence the answer to the problem of people coming to a state in India in search for work? MNS had posed this question and many of you nodded in
assent.
There were people who were lambasting Karan Johar for succumbing to MNS decree. Now we see why he didn't resist.
We are moving backward in time. Democracy graduates from a violent natured system to a system that runs on a careful exercising of the power to vote.
This time it was MNS. Who knows by the next election time we might have NINS ( North Indian Navnirman sena). All justifying their violence on one reason or the other.
We pose some questions that can be answered only by ourselves.
Mumbaikar Lose As MNS Wins
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Mayuresh Gaikwad
October 23, 2009
01:47 AM
People usually vote for the person who they think, is best suited to look after their narrow interests, rather than for the one who can act in the larger national interest, which may not be as beneficial individually to a particular group.
You say: "What happened to the not so intellectually backward class of Mumbai? Those who voted MNS to power how are they going to justify it?"
I would say: What's with the people of India, who keep voting the Congress party to power which, even after 5 decades in power, believes in pursuing policies that keep people poor, rather than pulling people out of poverty!
A party which wastes money on schemes like NREGA which, by their own admission, is riddled with corruption. They routinely come up with policies which, by the very nature of their formulation, encourage corruption and poverty!
A party that gave ministerial berths to people responsible for the 1984 riots, the worst in the history of independent India after the partition riots. A party that wants to punish (and rightly so) the perpetrators of the Gujarat 2002 riots, but wants kids glove treatment for the perpetrators of the 1984 riots, where 3,000 sikhs were killed by congressmen!
Most poor vote for the congress because it promises them schemes like NREGA and reservations for them in jobs, etc., which shall benefit them more than others, rather than investing in education or infrastructure which shall benefit India. In the end, it ends up being a zero-sum game instead of a win-win situation for all
santosh pawar
URL
October 24, 2009
08:51 AM
i am surprised at the comments made in this article. Mr. mishra is not sure about his view himself. at one point he say mns has nothhing to do woth wining of candidate becasue the cnadidate were working in their respective areas. so you yourself said that candidate given by mns were working in respective areas so the people had voated them so what wrong i doing that? how can mumbai lost if mn wins? can mishra explain.
who say that the poor class doesn't have the "intellectual" capability to decide between right and wrong? are you the one who will decided who is wrong or who is right.who are you decided what mumbai ppl should do or not do ? what have you done for the city if you are staying in this city ?
you can accept win by DMK, AIDMK, TELGU DESHEM , AGP IN ASSAM BUT YOU CAN NOT BE HAPPY BY WIN OF MNS IN MUMBAI . WHY?
PPL like you are creating the term goonda raj for MNS. why dont you talk about attack in karanataka on biharies recently , if he insist on marathi you are hurt but same mishar when goes to south will not utter a word in hindi but speak in english or learn local language but in mumbai he will insist that he will speak in hindi not in marathi . why is the question aksed not only by me but many lakhs of voters who support Mns which resulted in 13 MLA.
where was Mr. mishra gone when Mp sanjay nirupm said that the congress should give 40to 60 seats to up or biharies is this not dividing mumbai on base of language . you are talking about election in maharshtra no in up or bihar do what you want to do in your stae but not in maharashtra . you can see in results in mumbai speficially even the kripa sing has touch fight & he won only by 11,ooo vots that to you known how in has created up bihaires voter base in kalina, but next time it will changed
wait for next election you will see mns coming to power & ppl like you will be first to say yes we are behind you raj
What happened to the not so intellectually backward class of Mumbai? Those who voted MNS to power how are they going to justify it?
commonnsense
October 24, 2009
11:13 AM
people vote whom people vote for, not ones we want them to vote for. 2+2=4
ct
October 25, 2009
03:41 AM
No one in Mumbai cares for what some North Indians want them to do. Its their constituency and they'll vote for whom they think will serve them best and if it is the northie bashing MNS so be it. There is a lot of resentment among the local Marathi speaking people about immigrants descending on them and depriving them of jobs and living space.
Golden Boy
URL
October 25, 2009
12:03 PM
Abhinandan Mishra: "Why do we point fingers at the illiterate class when they elect criminals to power? Don't we say that the poor class doesn't have the "intellectual" capability to decide between right and wrong?"
Mr.Mishra, if you would have been Mr.Pawar or Mr.Shinde, you would have been on the other side of the Marathi vs. North Indian Divide!
Your words that "poor class doesn't have the intellectual capability to decide between right and wrong", is dumb-founded!
Intelligence is not the forte of just the elite few Intellectuals! Infact I have seen a total 'out-of-touch-with-reality' quality in the arguments given by Intellectuals against the MNS. The MNS is just raking up a real issue, that of matters pertaining to Employment at the grass root level in Mumbai and Maharashtra. I have travelled to other towns of Maharashtra and seen for myself how immigrants from UP and Bihar are flooding the State!
Ofcourse I don't believe any Politician cares for such issues (and the MNS may just be trying to exploit a real problem for its own selfish interests), but the mere fact that the common man chooses to vote MNS in power is reason enough to believe that the local marathi population who are labourers etc suffer due to the high level of immigration from states like UP and Bihar.
These are the people who are let down by huge elephant statues in their own states and all the Chara Ghotaala over the years, who make way to Mumbai and work for cheaper wages, affecting the life of local Marathi population at the economic bottom of the ladder in the State..
The poor and the uneducated are not idiots in Maharashtra, mind you! They know what their problems are and know whom to vote for and whom to vote against! The majority of voters in Maharashtra are mature enough to vote intelligently in favour of Parties who take their everyday problems into account!
THere is a real economic problem and large scale frustration amongst the economically backward Marathi population, that finds itself out of jobs due to the torrent of immigrant population in the State!
Mishraji, ask your Politicians in UP and Bihar to stop erecting great statues of elephants and their own idols, ask them to stop feeding Cattle with money, and look after their people so that their people don't have to immigrate to Mumbai to work for cheaper wages here!
Cribbing about MNS won't help!
-Golden Boy
Golden Boy
URL
October 25, 2009
12:14 PM
correction, comment #5: "Your words that "poor class doesn't have the intellectual capability to decide between right and wrong", is UNREASONABLE... (not dumb-founded!!!)
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