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Interesting TRUE Story!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WHO
BUILT BOMBAY?
According
to ancient history, a grouping of seven islands
comprising
Colaba, Mazagaon, Old Woman's Island, Wadala, Mahim,
Parel, and Matunga-Sion formed a part of the kingdom of
Ashoka the Great of Magadh, ironically in North India
.
The Bhaiyas and Biharis whom the Thackerays
accuse of being outsiders in Mumbai, come from the
region,
which was a part of Ashoka the Great's empire.. We judge
everything according to history and the history of
Mumbaiproves that its earliest known ownership was with a
North Indian.
The seven islands of Mumbai passed
through many hands, the sultans of Gujarat , the
Portuguese and the British. Every ruler left behind proof
of residence in Mumbai.
The Mauryans left behind
the Kanheri, Mahakali and the caves of Gharapuri more
popularly called Elephanta. The sultans of Gujarat built
the Dargahs at Mahim and Haji Ali, the Portuguese built
the two Portuguese churches, one at Prabhadevi and the
other St Andrews at Bandra.
They also built forts
at Sion, Mahim, Bandra and Bassien. The Portuguese named
the group of seven Islands 'Bom Baia', Good Bay . The
British built a city out of the group of seven islands
and
called her Bombay .
The original settlers of the
seven islands, the Koli fishermen, worshiped Mumbaidevi,
her temple still stands at Babulnath near Chowpatty. The
Kolis called the island Mumbai, 'Mumba, Mother
Goddess'.
In 1662, King Charles II of England
married the Portuguese Princess Catherine of Braganza,
and
received the seven islands of Bom Baia as part of his
dowry. Six years later, the British Crown leased the
seven
islands to the English East India Company for a sum of 10
pounds in gold per annum. It was under the English East
India Company that the future megapolis began to take
shape, after the first war for independence Bombay once
again became a colony of the British Empire
.
History has forgotten this but the first Parsi
settler came to Bombay in 1640, he was Dorabji Nanabhoy
Patel. In 1689-90, a severe plague epidemic broke out in
Bombay and most of the European settlers succumbed to it.
The Siddi of Janjira attacked in full force. Rustomji
Dorabji Patel, a trader and the son of the city's first
Parsi settler, successfully defeated the
Siddi with the
help of the Kolis and saved Bombay .
Gerald
Aungier, Governor of Bombay built the Bombay Castle, an
area that is even today referred to as Fort. He also
constituted the Courts of law. He brought Gujarati
traders, Parsi shipbuilders, Muslim and Hindu
manufacturers from the mainland and settled them in
Bombay
.
It was during a period of four decades that the
city of Bombay took shape. Reclamation was done to plug
the breach at Worli and Mahalakshmi, Hornby Vellard was
built in 1784. The Sion Causeway connecting Bombay to
Salsette was built in 1803. Colaba Causeway connecting
Colaba island to Bombay was built in 1838. A causeway
connecting Mahim and Bandra was built in 1845.
Lady
Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy, the wife of the First Baronet
Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy donated Rs 1, 57,000 to meet
construction costs of the causeway. She donated Rs.
1,00,000 at first. When the project cost escalated and
money ran out half way through she donated Rs 57,000
again
to ensure that the vital causeway was completed. Lady
Jamsetjee stipulated that no toll would ever be charged
for those using the causeway. Today Mumbaikars have to
pay
Rs 75 to use the Bandra-Worli Sealink, connecting almost
the same two islands. Sir J J Hospital was also built by
Sir Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy.
The shipbuilding Wadia
family of Surat was brought to Bombay by the British.
Jamshedji Wadia founded the Bombay Port Trust and built
the Princess Dock in 1885 and the Victoria Dock and the
Mereweather Dry Docks in 1891. Alexandra Dock was built
in
1914.
A Gujarati civil engineer supervised the
building of the Gateway of India . The Tatas made Bombay
their headquarters and gave it the iconic Taj Mahal Hotel
and India 's first civilian airlines, Air India . The
Godrejs gave India its first vegetarian
soap.
Cowasji Nanabhai Daver established Bombay's
first cotton mill, 'The Bombay Spinning Mills' in 1854.
By
1915, there were 83 textile mills in Bombay largely owned
by Indians.
This brought about a financial boom in
Bombay . Although the mills were owned by Gujaratis,
Kutchis, Parsis and Marwaris, the workforce was migrant
Mahrashtrians from rural Maharashtra . Premchand
Roychand,
a prosperous Gujarati broker founded the Bombay Stock
Exchange. Premchand Roychand donated Rs 2,00,000 to build
the Rajabai Tower in 1878.
Muslim, Sindhi and
Punjabi migrants have also contributed handsomely to
Mumbai.
Mumbai is built on the blood and sweat of
all Indians. That is why Bombay belongs to all
Indians.
Apart from its original inhabitants, the
Kolis, everyone else in Mumbai, including Thackeray's
'Marathi Manoos', are immigrants.
The "Mumbai for
Marathi Manoos" war cry has once again been raised to
shore up the sagging political fortunes of the Thackeray
family.
When the Shiv Sena-BJP combine came to
power in 1993, under the guise of reverting to the
original name they replaced Bombay with Mumbai.
I
wonder when they will discard the anglicized Thackeray
and
revert back to their original Marathi surname
Thakre?
This article was written on February
7, 2010 by Tushar Gandhi, founder/president, Mahatma
Gandhi Foundation, and the grandson of
Gandhiji.
--
O HUMAN !!! KNOW AND WORSHIP YOUR
CREATOR
