An owner of a sweets shop named Karachi Sweets in Mumbai had to hide his shop’s name with newspapers after a Shiv Sena leader named Nitin Nandgaokar threatened him to change it and use some other name in Marathi.
Mumbai: Video of Shiv Sena leader Nitin Nandgaokar goes viral, where he’s allegedly asking Karachi Sweets shop owner in Bandra West to change the name ‘Karachi’.
— ANI (@ANI) November 19, 2020
“You have to do it, we’re giving you time. Change ‘Karachi’ to something in Marathi,” says Nitin Nandgaokar in video. pic.twitter.com/PfmM4B65ac
In a viral video of the incident, Nandgaokar can be seen asking the owner of the Karachi Sweets shop located in Bandra West to change the name of his shop to something in Marathi. He said that he hated the name of the shop and that he would give him time to change the name. As per the conversation in the video, the forefathers of the shop’s owner used to live in Karachi before partition which is currently located in Pakistan. They moved to India after partition and named their shop as Karachi Sweets in memory of their former homeland.
Talking to the Karachi sweets owner Nandgaokar said, “Aap yaha dhanda karo lekin Karachi naam se mat karo. Karachi naam se hamey bahut takleef hai. (You can carry on your business but don’t use the name Karachi on your shop. We have a problem with that name.)”. “Registered bhi jo hai naam use aap cancel karo. (You need to cancel the registration of the shop in that name.)”, he added.
Nandgaokar said that Pakistan was a country of terrorists and he did not want anyone to use the name Karachi to run a business in India. When the shop owner tried to reason with him and clarified that the name had nothing to do Pakistan, the Shiva Sena leader told him flat out, “Karachi nahi chahiye. ( I do not want the shop to be named Karachi )”. He insisted the name to be changed. “Kar sakte hain, karna padega. (You can do it. You have to do it.)”, he told the shop owner.
Leaving the shop owner with no option but to change the name of the shop, Nandmgaokar said that he would give him time to do that. He told the shop owner that he he would come to eat at his shop after he changed the name of the shop.
Mumbai: The ‘Karachi Sweets’ shop in Bandra West – the owner of which was allegedly asked by Shiv Sena leader Nitin Nandgaokar to omit the word ‘Karachi’ from its name – now has the name covered with newspaper. https://t.co/yksVJcEvay pic.twitter.com/Ckedbi9SbA
— ANI (@ANI) November 19, 2020
After the threat of the Shiv Sena leader, the shop owner covered the name Karachi Sweets mentioned in the signage of the shop at the entrance of the shop with newspapers.
