Marathi power

This morning, I woke up to a whole new neighbourhood. When heading to work, I realised that there was something changed about the shop signs and billboards all over Colaba. The local Vodafone store had its name plastered in Marathi right accross the original (which was something like 'translating' Coca Cola??), a tailor had hastily glued a piece of paper with the Marathi equivalent of his already Marathi name under the original signage, and even the local pet shop owner was furiously scrubbing off the Marathi sign that he had mistakenly fixed upside down. And if you are sitting down, you may also want to know that the Colaba branch of McDonald's also had a sign in Marathi right underneath the original. Some shops had more permanently-looking signs, no doubt from the previous wave of violence inflicted by the Shiv Sena fascist party on the war path of saveguarding Maharashtra only for Maharashtirans, and reviving the 'pride' in the Marathi language.
I am all for local languages and their flourishing. I am all for Maharashtrians speaking their mother tongue and being proud of it. I am all for the preservation of local culture and expression. I think every language is beautiful and unique. And I have all intention is speaking Bulgarian to my kids one day.
However, I think Marathi now will forever have a negative connotation for me, because of the 'methods' Mr Raj Thackeray is employing to convince people to do just that. Breaking shops and property of people who are feeding a family with their businesses; treatening; going on a rampage; lecturing and imposing on others what they think is 'right'.
Mr Thackeray, if you are so hell-bent on saving the Marathi language, why don't you fight for teacher's salaries to become more adequate? Why don't you sponsor a few marathi-medium schools with the same amount of money which gets wasted in the chaos and destruction your 'men' cause? Why don't you encourage Marathi book stores, search for talented writers in your native language, spread leaflets promoting the beauty and importance of it, start a magazine... I heard that you are now putting pressure on TV channels to start programmes in Marathi. Will you pay for the air time they may lose if those programmes are not watched? Will you compensate all these shop owners for whom it may be detrimental to have their business names displayed in Marathi? How can you force any private initiative to change its name to suit your purpose?
I can sit here and endlessly think of constructive ways and means to achieve your purpose. But of course, it is so much easier to break and destroy; it is so much more 'profitable' incensing a band of not very intelligent 'men' with nothing better to do in life, to go on a rampage and take out their frustration on people who actually work, call them your 'party workers' thus almost giving them a legitimate 'designation' allowing them to throw their weight around.
However, I really think the cherry on the cake was when your 'men' demanded that the Bombay Scottish school, a hundreds of years old institution, change its name to Mumbai Scottish. You are a genius, Mr Thackeray. I will not be surprised if tomorrow you send your 'men' to all public libraries and ask them to destroy all historical or age-old volumes which still mention 'Mumbai' as 'Bombay'.
With what guts do you think, Mr Thackeray, that you will be able to change a nation's history, an essential part of which is the English language, thanks to which now your compatriots can study in the best universities abroad, land profitable jobs, travel the world and communicate, read literature, and have such a big advantage over other Asian countries (completely underutilised, but this is a different subject). You are like a bully in a school yard, loathed solely because of your 'muscle power'. Only in your case this power is combined with lethal intelligence, able to manipulate people in following you in your destructive and power-hungry aspirations.
I will not be surprised if soon you demand Maharashtra's independence from the rest of India and proclaim yourself the king.

The 'imported' daughter-in-law diaries?

This week, my very talented brother-in-law Raj Patel (Gurtaj's sister's husband) launched his much-acclaimed book, Stuffed and Starved (www.stuffedandstarved.org), in Delhi. And while Harper Collins India made a mess of the whole exercise (topic of another post), there were a few light moments. One of the panelists started with a speech about Indians wanting everything foreign. He started with the lowest creature in the food chain - the worm. He bemoaned how worms are killed with pesticides, and then 'we' import worms from Mexico to do vermiculture. He continued with the more noble seeds and grains, went through the vegetables, and reached the sacred cow - which, it seems, we also cross breed like mad, or just import, with disregard to our biological heritage. "But that's not all," he raised his voice even more, with a glint in his eyes, proud of having found another soundbyte, "We are now not happy with Indian daughters-in-law, and prefer to get foreign ones!!!" He could have not known that the girl turning crimson red on the first row was an 'imported' daughter-in-law, but there were Gurtaj's friends (some of them with a lethal sense of humour), Dr Vandana Shiva whom I had interviewed, my in-laws, a bunch of relatives, the culprit who 'imported' me, my in-laws AND of course Raj. They all bursted out laughing (some of them going as far as pointing at me) - with double the strenght they would have usually - because the pun was oh-so-unintended. And the speaker beamed even more, proud of having cracked the joke of the evening.
So now, friends, it is good to know where I stand in the Indian tree of life:
worm
seed
grain
vegetable
cow
daughter-in-law (imported)
Or should I say, in the food chain of essential consumatives???
Thank you, sir!!!