The Hindu : Shiv Sena gropes on `Mumbaikar' campaign

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Friday, Jul 25, 2003

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Shiv Sena gropes on `Mumbaikar' campaign

By Mahesh Vijapurkar

MUMBAI JULY 24. The Shiv Sena, which originated a programme to curb the influx of migrants into metropolitan Mumbai and set 1995 as the cut-off year for one to qualify as a Mumbai resident, has no clue as to how to deal with those who came in after that date. An informed source in the Sena told The Hindu: "We still do not know how to send out those already here."

This programme, the brainchild of the party's executive chief, Uddhav Thackeray, who has the full backing of his father, the Sena supremo Bal Thackeray, is christened "Mee Mumbaikar" (I am a Mumbai resident) and has drawn a mixed response. Those who are worried about the pressures facing the civic services and the over-crowding owing to the continuing influx have backed it but they have not been able to suggest how to curb the influx without violating their constitutional rights.

On the other hand, there has been a forthright denouncement of the campaign by those who argue that under no circumstances can any Indian citizen be asked not to come and stay in Mumbai because it would be a perverse move that militates against the right of free movement of citizens. The fact that the Sena has been the originator of the idea has itself been enough for many to decry the scheme, though it has been explained that it is not against the members of any particular caste or community or those from a specified region.

However, this campaign has remained a concept, with Sena leaders holding brainstorming sessions on how to go ahead, though Raj Thackeray, Mr. Uddhav's cousin, threw a spanner in the works soon after "Mee Mumbaikar" was announced. Mr. Raj Thackeray wanted Maharashtrians to be given prominence and rights even if it means circumventing the laws. This, however, has been allowed to go on a parallel track, separately from the "Mee Mumbaikar" idea.

Notwithstanding this imponderable introduced by Mr. Raj Thackeray, the Sena leaders are out there to speak on any and every platform available. They have been heartened by the Chief Minister, Sushilkumar Shinde, at one point speaking of the need to ease overcrowding in Mumbai but suggesting that it is for the Centre to devise means to do that. Merely to speak of over-crowding, the Government has begun to realise, without suggesting the means to deal with it, is unrealistic. But a class distinction, it appears, has been introduced. The Sena elder, Pramod Navalkar, a former Minister, recently said publicly that the party would like to "throw out outsiders who came after 1995." But he added that if anyone came with assured accommodation, even if only with a relative who has a single room to share, and a job on offer, then the Sena would not mind that person's arrival. Apparently, even the Sena does not think the A.R. Antulay method of just packing off all beggars rounded up in the city and leaving them away from the city's perimeter, will work. Those who were ejected thus returned, and so will the migrants, the Sena realises. But it just does not have a means to deal with past influx. The Sena declared the migrants who came after 1995 "illegal" and the Congress (I)-NCP Government which followed completed the task of giving pre-1995 migrants photo passes which enable them to avoid being evicted from their dwellings, even if it be in an illegal slum. Therefore, a source in the Sena suggests: "This Mee Mumbaikar may not take off unless we devise the means."

Devising such means does not come easy. Even when the senior Thackeray roared that if the Government did not evict Bangladeshi illegal migrants from Mumbai its party cadres would "ferret them out" for deportation under the law, it remained a threat and the then Sena Chief Minister, new in office, had to keep explaining that he had a constitutional obligation to ensure that the state did its job and at the same time see to it that his boss in the party is kept happy.

Till that happens, the same source said, "Mee Mumbaikar may remain a grand dream," one that is confined to involving the citizens in keeping Mumbai clean.

But the fact remains: the Sena is turned off by the slums that house 55 per cent of the population of Mumbai. But it failed to provide them with free housing as promised even though it remained in power for five years.

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Shiv Sena gropes on `Mumbaikar' campaign