I haven't studied this subject in depth, but being a maharashtrian and a marathi I have always heard about "Maharashtrian mentality" which is pulling the marathi community back in the race of power. Its been a common topic discussed amongst marathi as well as non-marathi community in Maharashtra.
I came across two articles on this topic by a non-marathi and a marathi. One tried to quote the reasons of Maharashtrian's failure in business and other tried to rule out any failure,rather he claimed marathi influence in the field of arts and sports.
Is it enough to compare whole marathi community on the basis of how a marathi performs his business or how his work ethics are or how much flexibilty he has at his work place? Is it enough to prove that the marathi's are not ruled by non-maharashtrian because they are excelling in sports and arts?
However its bitter but one should agree that there is a remarkable hold of non-marathi's on Mumbai and whole Maharashtra politics.Its not limited only to Mumbai but in every market and every office,even in the administrative departments we see non-marathi supremacy. We simply cannot deny that marathi people failed to defend themselves against non-marathi's encroachment on marathi territory.Or is it that we never realized that there is encroachment? And now we are so despaired that we see no hope to rise against this non marathi dominance? Or is it the "Marathi mentality" which is holding marathi people back from taking any action? Are we afraid that we would succumb to this dominance and nobody will give us a helping hand to come out of it evenif they are sympathatic and capable?
What is this "Marathi mentality"? Does this overshadows Marathi's only? Its not that non-maharashtian's are free from this mentality.Let's go deeper into this topic and try to find the roots of this mentality.If we try to go back into India's history, we could see that there was Chhatrapati Shivaji or Peshwa's were free from this mentality.Tilak,Hedgewar,Sawarkar,Agarkar,Tatya Tope all were marathi's.And Nathuram Godse also was a marathi.I am not proud or ashamed of him.He is a part of Indian history and it needs guts to murder a man.Ofcourse he had reasons and we could have different opinions about him.Anyways,let's not digress.Let's not label this mentality as "Maharashtrian".If you go back in pre-indepence era,everybody had this same thinking.We hold marathi's responsible for their downfall because we do not support each other,rather, given a chance, we betray each other for smallest of small opportunity to climb up the ladder of success.Was it not true when British ruled India?Weren't people uncoopretaive to the rebellions who wanted independent India?They not only betrayed the freedom fighter's but sold their independence to get promotion in British services or to win a piece of land.We blame marathi's to be afraid of taking any actions which could be risky for his life or career despite all the available facilities.Was is it impossible for Indians to gain our independence back from British Army?How many were they and how many were us?What held us back then?Can we call this mentality as a Maharashtrian? In first place, how did East India company become successful in establishing its roots in India? We were to busy to fight with neighbors.Weren't they from Punjab,Delhi,Haryana,Uttar Pradesh or Rajasthan?If they are so clever and alert how did they couldn't realized Company's motive? Or were they so desperate to prove their supremacy to the neighboring maharaja's that they readily walked into Company's trap?First article said that Marathis are ready to break but not ready to show flexibilty.What about those people who were not ready forget their differences temporarily and unite to fight against their enemy? These people also lacked unity.They also lacked flexibilty.They were too stupid to forgive the enemy and then killed by the same enemy.It was Sambhaji Raje from Maharashtra who denied to become a muslim and there was Mirza Raje from Rajasthan who readily married their sister to a muslim under pressure and who happily fought against Shivaji to show their faith to Moghuls. Do you expect this kind of flexibilty?It would have been impossible to fight for the freedom with such a ethical and moral flexibilty.
Non marathi's have no right to blame marathi's for being opportunists,coward,spineless and egoist because they belong to a lineage who has same character,may be worse than marathi's.Its only 58 years after independence, shouldn't a non-marathi forget his past so early and so quickly.
I agree with the second author who asked the readers to think over the circumstances with broader views.We should first see how Gujarati people or Rajasthani people are behaving in Gujarat or Rajasthan.I am 100% sure that the scenario there is not different than Maharashtra.But they are not ruled by marathi or other people.Marathi's are not faultless.They need to come out of their secured world and face the rough realities.In one of the articles it is mentioned that marathis don't have motive to make progress.They don't have competetion in their community.Kirloskar is already a hot shot in marathi community and he doesn't have a motive to become Tata,Birla or Ambani.I completley agree with this point.We do not dream big.we harp on achievements of Shivaji and Peshwe and now we have representatives in our history book why should we strive to make a history or be a noticable part of it.Acheiving a highest position in a company makes me on the top of marathi world why should I own it?I am getting my meals and other luxuries why should I work harder to be a ruler when I am getting all my comforts being a servant.Come on people think big! Its been 58 years after independence and other people are deciding the direction of politics.Business policies are decided my non-marathis.We should not tolerate this dominance.
It could be true that people from other resion of country could behave in a similar manner as a marathi behaves in Maharashtra but we never see Marathi influence on any other part of India.When they come out of their state they always unite and try to help people from their state ot community.How many Marathi do that?We don't help each other when we are outside Maharashtra.We are mean and laid back people.We are the materialssutiable for servants.No unity,no motives,no principles,no sense of belongingness to Maharashtra.We are divided.
Work hard.Be in the focus of media.Be a fierce compititor, no matter how high you are in marathi community you should not be satisfied till you reach the top of entire Indians.Do not stamp yourself as White collar people.Form non-governement organizations.Help other people in country.Show your presence and make others to notice it.
Remeber the world is changing.If your survival demands some flexibilty,aleast think about the other possibilities.Do not deny it right away.
Jai Maharashtra!
