‘Congress has always had contempt for Maharashtra’

Maharashtra Ekikaran Samiti chief Kiran Thakur holds the Congress government at the Centre and state responsible for its apathy towards the Marathi speaking population living along Karnataka’s border. He has renewed the pledge to take to the streets to voice the injustice towards the Marathis in Karnataka. In an interview to DNA, he speaks about the Congress leadership’s hollow assurances.

How realistic is your demand for the merger of 865 villages along Karnakata’s border into Maharashtra? 
For the Marathi-speaking people living in these villages, it is a matter of life and death. How else does one explain the long bloody battle we are fighting for over five decades? The people who are subjected to humiliation and atrocities know what a horrible life they are leading in Karnataka. Our organisation has been relentlessly raising the issue with both the state and central leadership. We brought up the issue before the Indian parliament, president of India and chief minister of Maharashtra, in vain.

Hasn’t the boundary row become a weapon for some political parties to score points over the Congress?
To some extent it is true that the political leadership in the state is always raising the matter to serve its own interests. But nobody can deny the hardships caused to the Marathi-speaking people because of the stepmotherly treatment meted out to the Marathi-speaking people of Karnataka. How can anybody justify the brutal police lathi-charge against demonstrators in Belgaum? The democratic rights of the people have been taken away by the Karnataka government.

I can understand the sentiments of your generation, but what about the new generation?
It’s not any generation. The moot point is whether those living here are given freedom to exercise their political mandate and speak the mother tongue Marathi. Why are their voices suppressed? Why can’t they allow a Marathi mayor despite it being a public mandate in Belgaum?   

But the Centre has indicated that the affidavit was based on earlier submissions which categorically said language cannot be the only criteria for allowing a merger?
It is a ridiculous argument. If that were the case, what was the integral factor that led to the creation of states all over the country? Why is it that when it comes to the rights of Marathi-speaking people, the Centre adopts double standards? What is very annoying is that the Centre does not want to find a long-lasting solution.

Are you accusing the Centre of bias?
It is evident from their actions. The Congress leadership at the Centre, right from the days of the first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, always had terrible contempt for Maharashtra. The same prejudice continued for the last five decades. I think our state leaders are also to be blamed. They always bow to the diktats of the central leadership.

The state government has always supported your cause…
That’s an eye-wash. How many times has CM Ashok Chavan discussed the matter with the central leadership in the past? Did anybody from the state government hold any discussions with the advocates at the Centre who were involved in the legal wrangle? Did we ensure the best advocates are hired? It is disgusting to think how little the state has done for the suffering Marathi people in Karnataka.