BJP MP Nishikant Dubey on Monday dared Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray to visit Bihar and Uttar Pradesh amid a row over the Marathi language and said he will be beaten up if he travels to the two states of the Hindi belt.
Dubey’s remarks came days after MNS workers assaulted a food stall owner in Thane district’s Bhayandar for not speaking Marathi.
Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) workers assaulted a food stall owner in Thane district’s Bhayandar for not speaking Marathi, and a businessman in Mumbai issuing a statement declaring he would not speak Marathi despite having lived in the city for many years.
“You people are surviving on our money. What kind of industries do you have?… If you are courageous enough and beat those who speak Hindi, then you should beat all those who speak Urdu, Tamil, and Telugu. If you are such a big ‘boss’, come out of Maharashtra, come to Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu – ‘tumko patak patak ke maarenge’… We all respect Marathi and the people of Maharashtra, who fought for India’s independence," Dubey said.
The BJP member accused Raj Thackeray and Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackery of doing “cheap politics" over Marathi ahead of the BMC election. “If they have courage – they should go to Mahim and beat any Hindi or Urdu speaking people in front of Mahim dargah," he said.
Shiv Sena (UBT) Rajya Sabha MP Priyanka Chaturvedi hit out at Dubey and asked who made him the decision maker of what other party leaders should be doing.
She also asked if Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis agreed with their party MP’s language with regard to the people of Maharashtra and his disparaging comments about hard-working people of the state.
“Who made him the gatekeeper of Hindi? Who made him the tax keeper of India? Who made him the spokesperson of industrialists? Who made him the decision maker of what other party leaders should be doing?" she asked in a post on X.
Taking cognisance of incidents of violence over Marathi, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Friday said while there was nothing wrong in expecting people to speak Marathi in the state, it was unacceptable to resort to violence for its insistence and that one cannot be “obstinate" about it. He also warned of legal action against those taking the law into their hands over the issue.
For the first time in two decades, Uddhav and Raj Thackeray held a joint rally on June 5 to mark their “success" in getting the Devendra Fadnavis dispensation to withdraw two government resolutions (GRs) on the three-language policy under NEP 2020 and teaching of Hindi from Class 1 in English and Marathi medium schools.
At the event, Uddhav and Raj Thackeray, leaders of the Shiv Sena (UBT) and Maharashtra Navnirman Sena, respectively, had vowed to oppose all attempts by the government to “impose" Hindi and “sideline" Marathi in the state.
