West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Bannerjee speaks to supporters as Bollywood actor Mithun Chakraborty and party leaders look on during a rally in Kolkata yesterday.
IANS/Mumbai
Mumbai’s transport operator BEST has started withdrawing from its fleet of buses a Gujarati newspaper’s advertisement glorifying Gujaratis, following objections from the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena.
“We have started removing the advertisements... These ads were released through a contractor for about 200 buses. They (ads) will be removed over the next few days,” a senior official said yesterday.
The MNS criticised the ads by Gujarat-based Sandesh Newspapers Ltd, heralding its new Mumbai edition in Gujarati, Sandesh.
The ad said: “Who is responsible for Mumbai’s financial and intellectual development? We Gujaratis...”
An MNS leader said the Gujaratis’ financial contribution to Mumbai’s growth was true to an extent but the city’s intellectual development came from stalwarts like late Bal Thackeray and Jagannath Shankerseth.
He said the ads hurt the sentiments of Mumbaikars and demanded their immediate withdrawal.
Defending the ad, Sandesh Newspapers Ltd managing director Parthiv Patel said it only spoke about the achievements of Gujaratis living in Mumbai.
This is the second time in a fortnight that Gujarati-Marathi relations have come to the fore in Mumbai.
On May 1, the Gujarati community was targeted in an editorial in the Shiv Sena mouthpiece Saamana. Later, party leaders, including Uddhav Thackeray and Aditya Thackeray, expressed regrets over it.
