Popular Marathi music composer and singer Kaushal Inamdar has criticised BJP Mumbai president Mangal Prabhat Lodha delivering a speech in Hindi on the floor of the Maharashtra legislative assembly.
Sharing a video clip posted by BJP Mumbai featuring Mangal Prabhat Lodha’s speech, Kaushal Inamdar wrote on Twitter, “You need to know the language of the region in which you are elected. The issue raised by Mangal Prabhat Lodha is right but only Marathi should be spoken in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly. For this, Marathi training classes should be started for Marathi MLAs. This applies to all parties.”
मुंबई ज्यांच्यामुळे चालते (स्वछ राहते ) अशा @mybmc मधील सफाई कामगारांना हक्काचे घरे मिळणे गरजेचे आहे. त्यांना न्याय देण्याची आवश्यकता आहे.अशी मागणी भाजपा मुंबई अध्यक्ष @MPLodha यांनी नगर विकास मंत्री @mieknathshinde यांच्याकडे केली. pic.twitter.com/FQLYgCfwdK— BJP Mumbai (@BJP4Mumbai) March 24, 2022
In this video, Mangal Prabhat is speaking in the assembly about giving houses to the cleaning workers of Mumbai Municipal Corporation. Lodha demanded that Urban Development Minister Eknath Shinde grant city’s cleaning workers.
Mangal Prabhat Lodha’s speech in Hindi has received a lot of flak on Twitter too.
“Mr. MLA, why are you not speaking in Marathi?” wrote one user. “Are these MLAs from UP, Bihar? What is the problem for them to speak Marathi?” commented another.
“Mumbai belongs to Marathi people, then BJP MLA should be able to speak at least 4-5 sentences in Marathi in Maharashtra Legislative Assembly,” remarked another.
Mangal Prabhat’s speech has drawn criticism against the backdrop of Maharashtra government stressing its demand to accord classical language status to Marathi.
Earlier, Subhash Desai, senior Maharashtra minister, also met with Union Culture Minister G Kishan Reddy and demanded that Marathi be granted classical language status. He further warned of a public agitation if Marathi was not given the status of classical language.
Desai claimed that Reddy told him that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah were in favour of granting Marathi classical language status and that a decision was likely soon.
The Maharashtra assembly unanimously passed a resolution in 2020 recommending the Centre to grant Marathi classical language status.
There are currently six Indian languages categorised as classical: Tamil was the first to be designated as a classical language in 2004, followed by Sanskrit in 2005, Kannada and Telugu in 2008, Malayalam in 2013, and Odia in 2014.
