A picture of an autorickshaw with an inappropriate message has gone viral on social media. The viral post was shared on Twitter by a user named Roshan Rai with a caption that read, "This is Xenophobia of the highest order. Regional pride cannot be used as a justification for treating people from other states as 3rd class citizens.”
The post featured a picture of the auto stuck in traffic, with a message on the back that can be read as, “U are in Karnataka, learn (Kannada). Don’t show attitude U f***r. U come to beg here.”
The viral image has sparked outrage among netizens; many users commented on the post, while others have reposted it to their feeds. Another user named Alankrit Shukla posted the picture on his Twitter account, praising his stay in Maharashtra and comparing both the states—Maharshtra and Karnataka.
"7 years in Maharashtra & never ever felt like i dont belong to that place. Marathi people are so open hearted and they never imposed their language on me. As soon as they understand you dont understand Marathi they will switch to Hindi. Thanku #Maharashtra for better exp," Shukla captioned the post.
These posts grabbed a lot of eyeballs online, and even though netizens were absolutely furious over the posts, there were a few who spoke about stereotypes.
"Kannadigas are humble too. Let’s not stereotype a region based on individual experiences,” wrote a user.
Another user commented, “Well, I won’t learn Kannada. You can easily manage with knowing just Hindi in Bangalore. If you don’t want to do business with me, then it is your loss. This auto driver will lose more customers because of his hostile attitude.”
“This is unacceptable," commented another user.
“If you go to work in Germany, you'll learn German. Same way if you work here you have to learn to communicate in Kannada,” a user remarked.
"I guess 7 years is more than enough to learn marathi. Learning local language is not imposition. Can you imagine someone living in UP or Bihar for 7 years without knowing hindi. Using words like 'beggar, f*ck*r' is inccorect. But asking to learn local language is correct," wrote another user.
"Better learn Marathi," wrote another user.
“Well, you haven’t seen the entitlement that Hindi speakers have,” another user quipped.
