COLUMN Spot the difference Kumar Ketkar Posted online: Wednesday, February 13, 2008 at 2308 hrs Raj and Uddhav Thackeray recently spoke of inclusive politics. Why that promise proved to be empty.
Lewis Carroll would have been stumped by what is happening in Mumbai today. Carroll%u2019s Tweedledum and Tweedledee fight, only to embrace and escape together in the face of a thunderstorm. A casual and apparently spontaneous repartee between Abu Azmi and Raj Thackeray has given the impression that a massive confrontation is brewing. If not for the sensationalising electronic media picking up on stray and provocative remarks, the so-called violent divide between the north Indians and the Marathi community would have withered away in a couple of hours. The city has witnessed far more violent outbursts from Raj%u2019s uncle, Shiv Sena chief Balasaheb Thackeray, and the likes of Abu Azmi. Mumbai%u2019s citizens have learnt to take these aggressive debates in their stride. These antics create tension in some small areas for a little while and then quickly die down. In the crowded streets and trains, nobody really knows or cares who is Marathi or who is Bihari. There are nearly fifty small-time professions that are dominated by the so-called north Indians. These could have been done by the sons of the soil too %u2014 like driving taxis or distributing milk, selling bhelpuri or running a laundry, which means ironing clothes for the vast middle class of the city includ
