Karunanidhi has a war of words with Shiv Sena

CHENNAI - Locking horns with the Shiv Sena over the ‘Mumbai for Marathis’ issue, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi on Wednesday said it has no takers in Maharashtra and dismissed all reports that said the people of the South were ‘anti-Hindi’.

The DMK patriarch said, “Even in Maharashtra there is no support for his (Shiv Sena President Uddhav Thackeray’s) views.”

Uddhav Thackeray had on Sunday attacked all the other parties that countered its views by saying that ‘Mumbai was all for Indians.’

On Sunday, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s ideological associate, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) had asked its activists to protect north Indian immigrants from attacks in Maharashtra.

In response, Thackeray had asked them to look to the South and teach Hindi in the region.

Refuting the impression that people in the South were ‘anti-Hindi’, Karunanidhi said

political parties did not have any ‘narrow view’ to drive out people speaking other than the respective regional languages.

“There is no political party in the region which has a narrow view and sought to drive out people speaking other than the respective regional languages,” he added.

Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday criticized both the Shiv Sena and the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) for their unwarranted attacks on north Indians, and said that every inch of India belongs to each and every Indian.

Gandhi reminded both political outfits that the commandoes who saved Mumbai during the 26/11 terror attacks were north Indians.

He further said that the commandoes, who forced their way into the besieged buildings, did not bother about which state they belonged to. (ANI)