MUMBAI: Not to be left behind by his cousin and MNS chief Raj Thackeray who has made Bihar-bashing his party's raison d'etre, Shiv Sena leader Uddhav Thackeray on Tuesday called for a permit system to check the influx of migrants from Bihar into Mumbai.

Such a demand was first made by his father and Sena chief Balasaheb Thackeray for all "outsiders" way back in the 1980s. Tweaking Raj's agenda, Uddhav said, "If the Bihar government doesn't allow the Mumbai police to track down a criminal in that state, then there should also be a permit system for migrants who come to Mumbai from Bihar to make a living."

Political observers see this as a bid to outdo the MNS and reaffirm the Sena's commitment to the cause of the ‘Marathi manoos'. Uddhav also declared that his party would not accept Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar as the NDA's prime ministerial candidate if he continued to stick to his stand on supporting "traitors". "The Bihar CM should have felt ashamed that the Amar Jawan memorial vandal turned out to be a person from Bihar," Sena mouthpiece Saamna quoted Uddhav as saying on Tuesday.

While Saamna has backed Raj on the issue of migrants, there are indications that the Thackerays may be wary of teaming up with the MNS. Matoshree is unwilling to go the extra mile to befriend Raj at this point of time, said a senior Sena functionary.

"Balasaheb and Uddhavji are clear that MNS is merely echoing Sena's son-of-the-soil agenda. The Sena cannot concede extra ground to MNS, which is just a six-year old party," he explained.

Uddhav, who is recovering from a recent angioplasty, will address a public meeting in Dadar on Friday on the issue of heritage in an attempt to consolidate the party's Marathi vote bank. Reacting to Uddhav's statements, BJP spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain said the Jan Sangh had fought against the permit system in Jammu & Kashmir. Hussain, an MP from Bhagalpur in Bihar, said Maharashtra was a part of India and every citizen of the country has the right to visit or earn livelihood in the state including Mumbai.

"We will not accept this. Every person from Bihar has the right to go to any part of the country," Hussain said.

Times View

Uddhav Thackeray is questioning the very idea of India when he says that there should be a system of permits for Bihari migrants coming into Mumbai. What would be left of the idea of a nation-state, particularly one that aims to be a liberal democracy, if governments start imposing arbitrary restrictions on the movement of people from one part of the country to another? Rather than painting migrants from other states, particularly those in the north, as the hated ‘other', the Sena leader would do well to recognize how important a role they have played in making Mumbai a modern, cosmopolitan metropolis. Mumbai is as much theirs as his.