I May Be Marathi, But…’: Bal Thackeray’s 1996 Video Resurfaces Amid 2025 Language Row — Sparks Debate Across 5 States
The ‘speak Marathi’ row gained fresh impetus after the Maharashtra government said in April that Hindi would be made mandatory for students from Class I to V
Mumbai:
An old video of the late Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray – in which he says “I may be Marathi in Maharashtra but I am Hindu in Bharat” – has resurfaced online amid the squabble between his successors, son Uddhav Thackeray and nephew Raj, and the ruling Mahayuti alliance, led by the Bharatiya Janata Party, over the primacy of the state language against the ‘imposition’ of Hindi.
In the video Bal Thackeray, with a saffron shawl draped over his shoulders, identifies himself as a ‘Marathi’ and a ‘Hindu’, and adds, “We must embrace Hindutva over linguistic identities.”
The clip was posted on X Saturday night, hours after Uddhav and Raj, estranged for two decades, came together for a ‘victory rally’ in Mumbai. The cousins were ‘celebrating’ forcing the state to roll back orders making Hindi the default language for primary school students.
Uddhav Thackeray – who faces an ongoing battle to be viewed as the successor to his father’s political ideology, particularly against the Sena faction led by Eknath Shinde that broke away and joined the BJP – also said Raj and he would contest the Mumbai civic body election together.
Echoing his father’s words, Uddhav Thackeray said his cousin and he would not let the BJP ‘impose Hindi on the people’, and called for unity between all of the Marathi population.
Raj Thackeray was more forceful in his comments, declaring “Try to touch Maharashtra and see what happens.” He also claimed the federal government’s three-language push – part of the 2020 National Education Policy and which has triggered political and linguistic protests in Tamil Nadu too – was a “precursor to the plan of separating Mumbai from Maharashtra
The ‘speak Marathi’ row gained fresh impetus after the state’s April order making Hindi mandatory for students from Class I to V. Pro-Marathi groups saw it as ‘Hindi imposition’ and protests broke out.
Last month the order was modified – Hindi was made the ‘default’ third language unless at least 20 students (an impossible threshold, education experts said) opted out. Pro-Marathi groups continued to protest as the issue quickly became a political face-off between the ruling alliance and the opposition.
All of this also led to violence in the name of Marathi; members of Raj Thackeray’s Maharashtra Navnirman Sena attacked a Mumbai shopkeeper and a man in Pune, while a video from inside the office an Uddhav Thackeray party MP showed staff of a mobile phone store being slapped.2
The attacks were triggered by the victims not speaking Marathi and criticising Raj Thackeray, and generated outrage, particularly since the MNS goons responsible haven’t been arrested yet.
All seven, in fact, were only briefly ‘questioned’ by the police before being released on bail.
The Maharashtra government, meanwhile, walks a tightrope between following through on the centre’s push to make Hindi the default language nationwide, particularly in the south, and alienating pro-Marathi voters – who have considerable voting clout – during an election year.
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has called for strict action against goons from Raj Thackeray’s party, but also declared the Marathi language should be ‘respected’ in the state.
A decades-old video of Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray has gone viral on social media, igniting fresh debate amid an ongoing language row in Maharashtra and four other states. In the resurfaced clip, dated 1996, Thackeray can be heard saying, “I may be Marathi, but I am proud to be Indian first,” a statement that has triggered contrasting reactions across political and cultural circles.
The video emerged just days after heated exchanges between pro-Marathi groups and Hindi speakers in Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur, Hyderabad, and Bengaluru, where tensions over linguistic identity have been escalating. Thackeray’s comments—once considered nationalist—are now being interpreted by different camps to support opposing narratives.
While Maharashtra-based parties like Shiv Sena (UBT) and MNS have used the video to reaffirm regional pride, others have highlighted Thackeray’s emphasis on national unity to cool tensions.
Social media is abuzz, with hashtags like #BalThackerayVideo, #LanguageDebate2025, and #MarathiVsHindi trending on Twitter/X and Instagram.
Political analysts suggest the clip could influence upcoming state elections, where language politics is becoming a flashpoint issue, especially in urban multi-lingual hubs.
