'Jaise China India me ghus gaya hai, vaise ham bhi ghusenge': Sanjay Raut on Maharashtra-Karnataka border row

New Delhi: Amid the ongoing Maharashtra-Karnataka border row, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut on Wednesday (December 21, 2022) said that they will enter the neighboring state just like "China has entered India". Speaking to reporters, Raut said that they want to solve the decades-old border dispute through a discussion but Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai is "igniting the fire". The Rajya Sabha MP also attacked CM Eknath Shinde and said that there is a "weak govt" in Maharashtra which is not taking any stand on the issue.

"As China has entered, we will enter (Karnataka). We don't need anyone's permission. We want to solve it through a discussion but Karnataka CM is igniting the fire," he said. 

#WATCH | Like China has entered, we will enter (Karnataka). We don't need anyone's permission. We want to solve it through discussion but Karnataka CM is igniting fire. There is a weak govt in Maharashtra & is not taking any stand on it: Sanjay Raut, Uddhav Thackeray's faction pic.twitter.com/d0okV6Wq8X — ANI (@ANI) December 21, 2022

Maharashtra has been demanding the merger of Belagavi and a few other neighbouring regions in Karnataka on the ground that these places have a substantial Marathi-speaking population.

It is notable that the Maharashtra-Karnataka border issue dates back to 1957 after the reorganisation of States on linguistic lines. Maharashtra laid claim to Belagavi, which was part of the erstwhile Bombay Presidency, as it has a sizeable Marathi-speaking population. It also laid claim to over 800 Marathi-speaking villages which are currently part of Karnataka. Karnataka, on the other hand, maintains the demarcation done on linguistic lines as per the States Reorganisation Act and the 1967 Mahajan Commission Report as final.

Meanwhile, Karnataka legislators have decided to pass a resolution in both the houses asserting the state's stand that the border issue is a settled one and there was no need to rake it up.