On Thursday, the Shivsena-led government in the state of Maharashtra approved the construction of an Urdu Centre in the Mazgaon area of Mumbai. The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) approved the tender to begin the project which is expected to cost the BMC Rs 12.88 crore.
According to the reports, the project Urdu Centre in Mazgaon is the brainchild of the Shivsena party who had announced its construction last year and had made a monetary provision of Rs 1.5 crore in the budget. The Urdu Centre is built in the area represented by the former chairperson of BMC’s standing committee, Yashwant Jadhav. Interestingly, Yamini Jadhav, wife of Yashwant Jadhav is the MLA of the Byculla constituency in which the project is located.
Secularism On Steroids in Maharashtra!!
— Maha Vinash Aghadi ᴾᵃʳᵒᵈʸ (@MVAGovt) May 19, 2022
• BMC under Shiv Sena floats tender for Urdu Ghar in Mazgaon; to cost around Rs. 12.88 CRORES.
• Meanwhile, more than 250 teachers have been protesting for more than 4 months, for jobs denied by BMC – as they studied in Marathi medium. pic.twitter.com/i3Sb309dLC
Jadhav last year had said that more funds would be set aside for the Urdu Bhavan in general and the body amendment. “This Urdu house will have a research center, auditorium, and library. It will become a hub for Urdu language learning excellence and scholarships. We will allocate more funds for this and work will start this year itself”, he had said. He had also asked the BMC to form a panel of Urdu scholars to oversee the construction.
Yashwant Jadhav has been under the Income Tax radar for enormous corruption and money laundering since February 2022. The Income Tax Department had raided his premises and found evidence of his close nexus with the Birhanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) contractors. The department had also found proof of around 3 dozen properties, worth Rs 130 crore approximately during raids on properties linked to Shiv Sena leader Yashwant Jadhav.
Marathi medium teachers being denied jobs
It is important to note that Shivsena who took speedy steps to approve the tender for Urdu Centre in Mumbai has allegedly been ignorant about the issue of teachers being denied jobs in BMC English Medium Schools. Around 250 teachers have been protesting against being denied teaching jobs in BMC English schools because they’ve studied in the Marathi medium.
“BMC is contradicting itself by asking schools to put up their names in Marathi letters and encouraging Marathi in official correspondence on one hand and denying teachers jobs over their medium of instruction on the other”, one of the protesters was quoted in April 2022. The qualified protesters are demonstrating against the Corporation for 4 months now and the civic body is yet to get in touch with the state government seeking directives in this situation.
It is notable here that all the 250 teachers have passed the Teachers Eligibility Test (TET) and Teachers Aptitude and Intelligence Test (TAIT) before being recommended for the jobs in schools. Still, just because they had studied at the school level in Marathi medium, they have been denied jobs in BMC-run English medium schools.
It is further important to note that, the political party Shivsena has been making efforts at appeasement politics to win the Muslim vote bank. The timings of approving the tender for Urdu Bhavan on May 19, ahead of the civic body elections 2022, and prioritising the project over the issue of teacher’s protest cannot be missed.
Reports mention that in Mumbai, the Muslim community can prove to be a decisive factor in the more than 30 seats in the 227-strong BMC. At present lone 29 of the 227 corporators in BMC are Muslims. The dates of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation election, 2022 are yet to be announced by the state election commission as of May 2022.
