Let us divide what Suresh Joshi, also known as Bhayyaji, a senior RSS leader said about Mumbai that kicked up a political storm in Maharashtra into two parts, thereby making some sense. One was, Mumbai does not have one language, and two, people coming to Mumbai don’t have to learn Marathi to get by. But that triggered a political storm.
He was right in saying both, but Maharashtrians are touchy about the Marathi language for it provides them an identity. After carving out states on linguistic basis under the Reorganisation of States Act, language as an identity has reached a level of being an aspect of sub-nationalism. Marathi is their asmita (identity).
This sub-nationalistic identity is more prominent in the southern part of the country than in the north where one gets by in Hindi. Travelers from other parts of the country would vouch for it. Tamil Nadu insists only on Tamil, Kerala only on Malayalam, Karnataka only on Kannada, and Andhra and Telangana see Telugu as the binder of people.
Now, back to Bhaiyyaji. He touched the Marathi nerve. For, only on February 3, the state government issued a government resolution (GR) making speaking Marathi in government offices mandatory. This applies to “all government, semi-government offices, local self-government bodies, state-run corporations and aided offices.” And he spoke just three days later.
It is much like the way the central government does, using three languages — English, Hindi, and the local language–in the signage in their offices. This is quite visible on signage on railway stations and banks. It is not uncommon to see the promotion of Hindi at nationalised banks where they have “today’s Hindi word” on blackboards.
Maharashtra has made only one exception. Those who come from other states and those from overseas can use other languages to communicate with those in government offices. This is part of the language policy which requires all government and government-related offices to put up signs asking for the use of only Marathi as the medium of communication.
For a long time, political parties have been demanding that even shops use only Marathi signage prominently. English and Hindi were to be secondary, and getting the commercial establishments to comply has been a task. Political parties had to flex their muscles to get the shops, for instance, to use new boards. Not speaking Marathi is disrespectful.
When Bhayyaji spoke of Mumbai itself being divided on linguistic basis – Ghatkopar having predominant use of Gujarati, as he pointed out -and Matunga seeing the usage of Tamil, or the people residing there belonging to these languages groups, he was not in the least far from the truth. In fact, he nailed it for most of the street language is Hindi. But he got under the skin of Marathi proponents.
That is because Marathi speakers are a minority in Mumbai owing to migration which has changed the demography over decades. The entry of migrants has led to the emergence of a pidgin language which is known as the Bambayya where both Hindi and Marathi merge and helps the Marathi and non-Marathi speakers to get by.
Only the second-generation migrants are at home in Marathi across Maharashtra because migration is not limited to Mumbai and the Mumbai Metropolitan Region. Anecdotal evidence exists of migrants arriving to smaller cities like Latur to take up hard work at market yards. Or drive auto-rickshaws. To help such populations, small food outlets in Kerala had helpfully put up their menu in Hindi.
His perspective, however, differed from that of the politicians who pounced on him with the Shiv Sena led by Uddhav Thackeray demanding that the RSS leader be prosecuted for treason. Given the RSS-BJP links, he and others asked if BJP agreed with Bhayyaji who later retracted, caving in under pressure. That part of his speech in a suburb was antithetical to Marathi manoos’ sentiments. The Marathi-speaking state was acquired after the sacrifice of many lives.
That agitation, known as the Samyukta Maharashtra Movement saw 106 people losing their lives and that memory is strong. That is why the state is constantly striving to secure the Marathi-speaking areas of Karnataka with no avail so far. There was a flare up recently when a Kannada-speaking bus conductor couldn’t speak with a Marathi-speaking passenger in Belgavi.
Mumbai and its far-flung metropolitan region see the use of Hindi for this region attracts migrants from all over the country and resistance to it has failed. Over two decades ago, Raj Thackeray’s men had even attacked the migrants as they arrived at the Kalyan Junction, and once the industrial and service sector of Nashik had come to a total halt because of an anti-migrant agitation.
To calm down the political parties which triggered an outcry after Bhayyaji’s speech at an event in suburban Mumbai, the chief minister, Devendra Fadnavis announced that Marathi was the state’s language, that people must speak it and if they do not (being migrants, especially), they had better respect the language and learn it.
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