Roma Shah writes – Maharashtra is not Gujarat sadly
Roma Shah writes – Maharashtra is not Gujarat sadly
By Roma Shah
Ahmedabad, DeshGujarat, 23 October, 2009
The Congress-NCP alliance has done it again. I really hope that the BJP understands that Maharashtra as indeed many parts of India, say UP etc , do not vote on development , good governance etc. Narendrabhai gave a speech about improving governance, development, integrity of leadership etc in Maharashtra , and despite his astounding record on these counts, it does not seem to have much resonance in Maharashtra in this poll or the earlier Lok sabha 2009.
Understanding the ground and the people
This is partly because as a state Maharashtra is substantially dominated by Marathas and in the in the words of Nirad Chaudhary , Marathas are “greedy and xenophobic”. There is a great sense of grievancehood. (and that’s why MNS big share of votes).
Also another reason, a Marathi-Brahmin acquaintance of mine, believes that for Maharashtrians integrity of leaders is not important. Maharashtrians simply want is to make it any means. So in this situation of grievancehood, greed etc a forward looking agenda (growth, good governance) is not all that important.
BJP must realize that …
The larger point I hope to underscore is that the BJP and particularly Shri Modi must realize that good governance, transformational economic development, security, integrity of leadership as planks have a huge appeal in Gujarat, but they do not necessarily have that same resonance across India. And also as Swapan Dasgupta had articulated earlier in ‘Modi has a point’ , “India which doggedly refuses to enter the 21st century?”. ( I do not mean to sing paeans to Gujarat but to highlight this contrast).This was also demonstrated in Lok sabha poll 2009, Congress despite achieving almost nothing in UPA I, came back.
The roots are in ideas of distorted Hinduism
The roots of these contrasting aspirations of India in my view, lie in the many ideas of distorted Hinduism- such as passivity, the irredeemable world, acceptance , detachment, moral relevatism etc, however erroneously interpreted they may be. (They get dispersed by osmosis in a civilization, even if every person has not read the scriptures). Gujarat is more inclined towards Semitic- Protestant thinking, owing to its Jain & Mercantilist influence, than the rest of India, which also explains its comparative religious intolerance, and its passion to be the best it can.
Sad story in repeat mode
According to experts, Maharashtra in the last 10 yrs has declined sharply on all growth and human development indices. Despite this it is a comment on mahasahtra’s citizens that they choose to bring a govt which is universally acknowledged by the likes of Shekhar Gupta (Indian express editor) and many others, that it was a terrible govt. So what message does this give the govt, do nothing and you’ll be back for still another 5 yrs. It was the same story with election 2009 and UPA-I and india choose to bring it back.
Hindu ethos and country’s political reality
The possible explanation for this as the Nobel laureate V S Naipual said are that Hindus (this country does have a Hindu ethos because they are 80 % majority) are
1. unaware of physical reality -which leads to muddled thinking
2. also Naipaul says -Hindus as a race learnt very little from previous disasters such as invasions etc .
3. as noted psychologist Sudhir Kakar said, Indians do not explore the external world to see how they can fashion it better for themselves, rather they are defined by it.
4. He also said that the Indian understanding of reality is “relatively tenous” or in other words not as strong and clear as western people.
This perhaps means we cannot hope to see a sensible , kind, benign, free of corruption , rule of law govt like the UK EVER, because Indians largely do not aspire for big , transformational economic growth, development or excellent governance. They are happy will very small ad-hoc incremental changes.
Gujarat is an exceptional case
Gujarat is an outlier to this, because its thinking is comparatively more Protestant (i.e. clear thinking, and the need for good governance, development etc), and less Hindu, its also not tolerant as Hindus generally are.
A telling example of being defined by reality is we pay bribes as speed money to get something done from govt, , but few have thought of getting together and actually changing this terrible system for the better.. Same with the water situation, people get tankers but no one it would seem wants to change the municipal system, which provides water.
| << Previous Post |
A well written article….You have written bluntly what many other journalist in “Free India” has not dared to….I hope one day Gujarat’s growth will be recognized by the world.Because Indians(except Gujarati’s) in India are simply hopeless…
Yes, its good article, and you see the main problem of whole India is packed in education. people who are not educated properly and mainly a book-reader type of, never understand to think it in fair way, review the things as neutral rather than think always like how he gets benefited, doesn’t matter it cost others. so solve the way people are getting educated and most of the problem will be solved.
a classic example is, I try not to cross the white line before zebra crossing if I am the first to reach the red light and most of the people feel they are safe and they don’t cross either. but if someone had (who was the first comer) than even if I stay behind that white line, most of the people goes till the point that first violator was.
bigger population is creating insecurity to the peoples mind and they soon try to see the nearest point/place/people/party/cast to hang.
I dont think people should be blamed for this. People want change in maharasthra but BJP and Sena clearly lacks good leadership qualities and proactive thinking to win election.
First and foremost, Raj thakre has to come back to Sena by any mean. I suspect, Raj Thakre is sponsored by Congress secretly. Congress is cleverly dividing BJP and Sena’s votes.
Same thing happend in hariyana. BJP is lacking a good leader who could have negotiated a deal with INLD. Even if they can not negotiate a deal, BJP should have not fielded candidates at all 90 seats just to make result in favour of INLD and kick out Congress from power.
In both states, margin of victory for congress are really narrow, BJP could have easily changed the final result with a bit clever thinking.
Idiot Rajnath is not capable of making any good decision for party.
I agree with Gujarati
Read this from Times of India
“In effect, the saffron combine lost 30% of the seats in Mumbai because the MNS played a spoiler. Had the MNS not been a factor, the Sena-BJP combine would have swept Mumbai, winning 26 of the 36 seats on offer.”
But I also agree with the author on majority of points she has discussed.
Nitin Gadkari is Maharashtra’s Narendra Modi. Unfortunately, we will have to wait for him to show his Charisma till 2014.
The Bandra-Worli Sea Link ( Named Rajiv Gandhi Setu by Congress dogfaces) was a brain child of Nitin Gadkari way back in 1998 when he was the PWD minister in the BJP-SHS government in state then.
He sanctioned the project on BOT basis for a total sum of 450 Crores.
1. A DUAL CARRIAGE WAY SEA LINK
2. TO BE COMPLETED IN TWO YEARS TIME FROM INCEPTION
3. TOTAL COST 450 CRORES
4. Should the contractor fail to complete the project he will have to pay a penalty of 5 Lacs per day.
The story behind the project is amazing:
1. The Sea Link opened THIS YEAR, 11 years after the contract was placed.
2. A SINGLE CARRIAGE WAY HAS BEEN CONSTRUCTED FOR A STAGGERING AMOUNT OF 1750 CRORES.
Nitin Gadkari just last week in a TV interview to a Marathi Channel said “Isn’t it the people’s responsibility to show some interest in this massive cost escalation and ask the Congress for a proper account?”
I think we Indians should completely do away with the chalta hai attitude and take politics more seriously. We are NUMBERS for these vermins, thats it, just numbers, till the time we dont stand up for our rights, nothing will change.
These elections again shows that add up MNS votes to the ones polled by BJP-SHS, 70% of Maharashtrians have VOTED THE CONGRESS OUT.
I think this malaise of chalta hai is the real reason behind BJP not being able to dislodge the evil Congress.
Forget about good governance. Congress has got it made for next thousand years. People like chawlas who hold post which is supposed to totally uncorrupt. And yet this man was making calls to congress while shitting. This is as good re-colonisation which will take long time to be independant from.
While mindset of voters in regional mold can be one of the things attributing to election results, the other important thing in this particular election was weak BJP and fragmented Sivsena. When corruption becomes a common practice accepted by whole society then it no more becomes an issue. In Gujarat there is comparatively less corruption but in other states, especially Maharashtra it has become a daily practice like a person consumes tea everyday normally. If such a non-performing, bad-performing government can be re-elected, then sensible Indian should leave this country. Settling abroad is good option.
Weak BJP is dangerous for our democracy. Sheela Bhatt writes on Rediff that over 40,000 farmers committed suicide in Mahrashtra post 1995. God knows what is ahead.
Congress rule in Maharashtra for last 10 years was the worst in the history of Maharashtra. Now people of Maharashtra have again voted to bring the same Congress to power..viz.. to rule them again for five years…
What are the people of Maharashtra thinking?
India is heading to become another Thailand, a Buddhist country similar to ethos of Hinduism, where there are two classes rich and powerful people who have formed nexus among themselves like politicians, business man and media. The rest all are poor and the middle class work like donkey and gets exploited by the nexus of rich people. There was a similar hue and cry in the early 90′s when thailand was growing as India is today. The Congress has already got all the money and media under its control. No business man can use his money power to revolt against congress because then he well be destroyed the next day. Maharashtra was developed a little earlier than rest of India and it is the mirror of what will happen to India in the next 5-10 yrs. This election victory is simply achieved by manipulation media and using money power.
Moral of the story is either try to enter their nexus or stay poor, don’t be in middle class because then you end up working most and watching helplessly as your money is being taken out.
As far as Modi is concerned, watch out for next election, there are already shrewdest mind in congress working for his defeat. Coupled with money power I think they will finish him in next election.
Everybody is forgetting one fact. Shiv Sena is no better than MNS. They have the same kind of ideology. How can a nationalist party like BJP can have understanding with SS? Though SS may have abandoned that ideology, their roots are in thinking that Maharashtra only for Marathi people. In past they have harassed Gujaratis Also.
People like me would remain away from polling rather than voting for SS.
i do not want to put my yahoo I.D here because any misuse by anybody..
first of all, i want to say that it is amazing intelligent comment here ,, i get some hope here for my gujarat land..
i want to put some comment or view of mine here.. dangerous thing is not a indian politics but it is a very less common knowledge of poor people.. if you see the way , youth enrgery is wasted on name of religion,cast politics… this amazing youth (from 15 years to 40 years) enrgery is so lucractive in western world now,, so it is not cool at all for india.. whole system must have to be change with TIME..
india must have to create a AUTOCRATIC , INVISIBLE political system for next 30 years… indian politics must have to be practical and young mind…. right now, common people must have to understand the difference or limitations between government,governance,political party,political decision,media ect.. before voting, he/she must have to see the intention and vision behind political party or leaders and their friends…
problem with congress is that they constantly playing in hand of american politics and american media, it is very dangerous because all american politics is dominated by white race, even the judiciary decisions. even if you see right now also,, because of india,china complain,obama is trying good but white people remove their face and connect with white race.. i am not saying that it is wrong because any small community feels insecurity.. in gujarat also, we feel same insecurity towards muslims (not all) because they are too agressive and spread terror since 1989 or even behind time.. i do not know but i read some history in google..
however, my point is that indian politics must have to be less and integrated, capatalist oriented.. i mean media has to be in different topics, student must have to interliked approach towards industry,, gujarat professors must give a challenge to indian industry leaders or CEO for innovations in news media so any student can learn that…..
well, whatever national media do bad things is not our priority in life ,, we as a young person have to learn and explor lot of things from the world.. scientist must come to natioanl media and give a answers to students so that any poor child can learn good in tv.. we have to change the behavior pattern of indians..
how temperature of earth is change now??? and how ?? it is might be done by american scientist so that whole north india become water less.. how you can change the temperature of north pool to south pool of axis of world??? do you know that?? in world war 2, there was a less tem. of earth.. why that time?? this type of question must have to understand at national level.. we(india) got so much talent that indian people does not know how to use it for good directions…
how to improve distribution system in country?? there must have a citizens credit systems and credit human behavior law,, so that we can remove any bad citizens.((that organization must have a power to remove anybody,anytime, and also without giving any reason…)) …
guys we have to create the I.T ,SCIENCE BASED, MATHEMATICS BASED, INTEGRATED TO GOVERNMENT,POLICE BASED,REGULATORS , politics and society citizens in india…. indian government must have to create a voice to public in form of president if any political party leader or member behave in bad manner.. it has to be constant…
see you guys,,, i do not know you guys,, put some funny ,cool videos here please..
so that we comment about it..
hey,modi tried to explain people in lok-sabha and this election wherever he went.i,listened his every singal speech
he gave.according to mass he described situation.for ex.in proper mumbai,he described the country’s
real situation.about china,about nepal,about hugi,about fake cuurency,etc.no,body took it serious.and look
what is happening today?
right from the begining congress always looked for power for ever.it new that vote banks are minority,villagers,
uneducated,pseudo secular,farmers,etc.therefor never cared about education system.if they provide perfect
system than people get rich,people get educated,and throw them out.so easy way to keep those backwards.
around election throw some pieces of loaf and get votes.right-off loans,subcidy to other things.
divide and rule is the english philosophy ,they persue.and unfortunately they can find those people
who become the handle of their knife.there is no effect of bala-saheb and uddhav.i,think raj has potential
to run shiv-sena.either bala saheb should make raj as incharge of shivsena or merge with mns.
and last more and more people and leaders in india are butt licking.no body has lion roar,iron will,
corageous ,adventures,chest. lamb and goats cannot choose their leader as lion.
once people will be lion hearted than modiji will be p.m.or national hero.well indians do not want to do that
gujarati will keep-on doin g.let others to fall in the feet of sonia and rahul.
i,also agree that advani-rajnath duo must leave and get retirement as soon as posible.
english people always laugh and say”WHO SAID INDIA GOT FREEDOM?MAY BE FROM US,BUT NOT
FROM OURPHILOSOPHY,NOT FROM NEHRU PARIVAR.SONIA-RAHUL NOTHING BUT OUR
RE-INCARNATION.”
JAI-HIND,JAI,JAI GARVI GUJARAT.JAI……JAI…..NAMO.
Thatswhy India is called as bloody third world , filty and corrupt country . India and Indians have no future and its better all good Hindus should migrate to other countries. Although i admire Gujarat and Modi , if Modi looses next election i wont be surprised since thatshow stupid Indians are. Indians hate genuinity , honesty and real development.
Maharashtra has proved to be a big disappointment in the neighborhood.
Infighting, chauvinism, and militant activism bears no fruit.
The need to stick firmly with development *Modi* and Ram bhakti is even greater.
The Marathis are been taken for a royal fool ride by the greedy Congress chamchaas and its off shoots raad Senas, In Maharashtra their false pride has cost them riots every 20 days.
Gujaratis must not fall into this trap, beware!
I explained many times in my feed back Modi model can’t work out side of gujarat as most of the politicians (99%, included all parties) are in the field to make money or for personal greed. There is only Modi saheb who is in the field with out any family need, money need but he has sort of little personal greed. To survive at central level the first thing required to manage many politicians with different speaking languages, cultures, agendas is not easy by modi model in India as we have weak law and enforcement, corruption, huge population, people are fighting based on cast, language, religion etc. To establish party in any region required huge work and time…it is not a over night game. If Modi saheb will go in central then we will see huge party crash as many politicians will face agenda crash with Modi saheb’s agenda and will go to other parties or fight election as individual and will make BJP more weak. On another side congress is trying to check mate Modi saheb in the fake encounter case….it seems eventually congress will success in it’s agenda as it is in the central with majority.
There is a lot of self-gratification and cynicism in the article. While marathis have been a bit more xenophobic than others, in the long run, it is essential to get people focused on good governance and mutual trust. There are many marathis who subscribe to these values and Modi and others should focus on empowering these individuals. The other option seems to accept fatalism and xenophobia as realities and start pandering to it. If that happens, we will have two congress parties and no BJP.
It is difficult to finish Modiji. Modiji is also having now too much money power. All the big industrailists are in his hand. Money is no consideration for Modiji. He lacks good advisors to govern. Scondly Modoji don’t believe in team work. Good bureaucrats are going away from Gujarat.
Whatever may be the reason, but at this point of time BJP is more like a domestic party rather than a national party. if Advani won’t quit, and if we won’t be able to see drastic changes in national leadership in near future, BJP will unfortunately become a past. Then we will tell stories of BJP to our next generation that Once upon a time there used to be a party called BJP in India.
No one going to here the development. BJP must start emotional issues to get votes. In Tamil nadu every day there us new Church coming on. It is time for BJP to gain vote @ any cast. India is under all-around attack from chain, Christian missionaries, congress, Red terror, Islamic terror, etc.
Marathis need to regain their pride just like (Bharatmaa nu Sinh) Gujarat.
Whenever Dadabhais and Tilaks and Gandhis and Gokhales and Patels and Bhaves join hands they can create a superpower out of Maa Bhaarati without causing any bloodshed.
Just their FIRM unity is sufficient which is what Desai and now Modi is trying very hard to do.
Let us wish Mahatma Modi saheb with our best of will power through our 100% voting percentage. For the next Gujarat elections we need to urge Gujarat Government to speed up all the infrastructure projects through a dedicated volunteer force by drawing expertise from a rich pool of retired people leveraging their strict monitoring skills and canvasing. Also, all the retired Army personnel should be deployed for intelligence gathering.
There is only one organization we belong to Maa Bhaarati.
BJP has to hold a membership drive to infuse maximum number of youths from colleges/sports/malls, and retired people coming to temples/parks/kathas, as dedicated voters for BJP.
We all need to join hands again and stomp out the brutal Congress chamchaas.
It is important that we excercise caution before using words like xenophobic etc etc for people in our neighbouring state. This type of results are mostly because the average middle class man does not go out and vote in general during elections. It is only the very poor and grassroot people who actually go and vote. The same problem of poor voter turnout exists even in Gujarat so let’s not resort to name calling etc.
Agree fully with @Rishi
It is time all Indians wake up to the gameplan of our enemies and firmly hold onto our rich heritage of knowledge, truth, and immortality, to prevent being swayed to darkness by the western winds blown through our biased media.
No need to accuse our neighboring state, they are going through despair and helplessness at this hour because of narrow-minded clashing ambitions. Gujaratis have a lot at stake and in common with the Marathis, and we both need to continue to learn from each other, because we cannot survive without each other. We both became victims of vicious Congress chamchaagiri politics. However in our case RAM saved us, and we can only hope that people like Gadkari, Hazare, Khairnar, and Suresh Prabhu can be instrumental in saving them from the clutches of mujra going chamchaas.
Interesting article, but I don’t agree with it. May be comments on Gujarat is correct, but comments on Maharashtra is not correct. All people need good governance and love it. Unfortunately, MNS cut the votes of SS which is restricted only to urban areas. BJP is kind of down as its supporters are now disheartened after last general election.
BJP MUST RESOLVE THE LEADERSHIP ISSUE WITHOUT WASTING A SINGLE MOMENT AND START WORKING.
ELSE, IT WILL BE TOO LATE.
to rishi: the charge of xenophobia has not been levelled lightly. a) just in the last half century maharashtrians have at one time or another been opposed to gujaratis, then south indians and finally now north indians. and its no good saying that politicians are to blame and the poor naive people are just led by them. if a politician wins, it’s because what he says resonates with his voters. why doesn’t any political party in gujarat make an issue of this? we have people coming from rajasthan, madhya pradsh, orissa, bihar and probably a few other states too. thats because in gujarat people believe that there are enough jobs to go around for everyone. in short they know how to increase the pie. maharashtrians unfortunately have no idea how to go about this. and thats amply proved by the fact that they barely have a vania class. everyone has a job.
and as for the bit about poor uneducated people only going and voting, my friend who works in a fashion magazine in bombay has a maharashtrian boss. he too openly supports the MNS saying whats wrong with preferential treatment for maharashtrians in Maharashtra and that its wrong if an outsider comes and takes their jobs.
GOOD essay.
Most relevant is TV News media and Print media are captured by foreign friends of SONIA GANDHI.
Murdoch the evangelist and Catholic church collectively from behind curtains control the INDIAN NEWS media, and hence is the King Maker.
For true democracy and Swaraj the country’s the media should be fair non corrupt and not foreign owned.
your views on gujarat may be correct but i dont agree with your views on maharashtrians, i am not marathi but i did not come to mumbai to develop mumbai or maharashtra i came to develop myself & at any cost local language & culture should be respected by me,
marathas are greedy & xenophobic????????????? then how come so many gujjus, panjabis, south indians are living & developing in maharashtra… so many minority educational institutions are there & employing quotas for their own community, how about south india where govt & people follow policies denying hindi & other languages?????????
its unfortunate that people like you form opinions based on your biased views no surprise that in marathis there is fraction which hates outsiders i think more than them people like you should be blamed first…
so stop blaming marathi community for it otherwise it will just push a lot of fence sitting marathis towards raj & mns, & it will be very harmful for all non marathis including gujaratis & north indians like me!!!!!!!
All I can see is sadly downfall of Maharstra further (sadly) and Gujarat getting benefitted. Is is good for India as a whole one must ponder. Look at major projects like DMIC and DFC. Even though it talks about connecting Delhi to Mumbai on high speed transport network and creating world class infrastructure. Only Gujarat is way ahead among six states, and sadly Maharashtra is last in the list. At this rate one day mumbai will also dilute its status.
LOL, good to see each state proud of its heritage. that is what we want. Ego will lead to achievement, and India dearly needs TONNES of achievement in ALL fields. Raj Thakaray is in my opinion an idea whose time has come, and it is going to work. Maharashtrians have been facing the brunt of free-markets and secularism, and political voices have been wanting to curb this for quite some time. As we all know, free trade’s only opponent is politics, and it will remain so.
I think that the rest of India should not fear, Maharashtra is not as backward intellectually as some others may think. Plus, the std. idea is that if some person A migrates to State B, that person A ought to follow state B’s lifestyle (or live in fear of being kicked out )
It is a huge misconception that Modi’s message does not work outside Gujarat. Coming in and making a speech is not enough to win an election. The author’s political understanding seems naive at best.
NaMo has created a miracle in Gujarat – no doubt. But he has been backed on the ground by a dedicated organization.
Maharastra is the perfect state on which Mr. Modi should focus. His message is resonating across all urban areas.
If you listen to NaMo’s speeches and Raj T’s speeches – if you understand both Marathi and Gujarati as I do – you will find very few differences on the topic of development.
Raj T. is effective in M’rastra not because of his Xenophobic rhetoric alone – he is marrying it very cleverly with NaMo’s development agenda.
Infact in almost every speech I have heard – Raj T. has referenced NaMo’s Gujarat miracle.
Lesson: NaMo has a vibrant constituency outside Gujarat – he needs to find a way to tap it. Helicopter politics alone will not work.
The comment that Hindus in Gujarat aren’t tolerant is ridiculous and blatantly untrue. I know many Hindus from Kerala and other places who have nothing but praise for life in Gujarat. I don’t know where this nonsense about “semitic-protestant thinking” comes from. It was in Gujarat (and subsequently Mumbai) where Parsis settled. If that’s not tolerance, then I don’t know what is.
Of course Gujarat has far more entrepreneur minded people so that is of course useful. “Mpanj” also makes a nice point that the development message can work. It’s just that there’s too many “dividers” and not enough “uniters” in politics.