It's not the first time Mumbai has burnt over the sons-of-soil issue. And while the Shiv Sena may be most famous for propagating it, from Tamil Nadu to Assam, the issue has found resonance across the country:

Maharashtra: In February 1956, the Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti was formed to spearhead the demand for a separate Marathi-speaking state out of the then-bilingual State of Bombay. Prominent activists included Prabodhankar Thackeray, the father of Bal Thackeray. In early 1960, protesters demanding a separate state were fired upon by the police at Flora Fountain in the capital city of Mumbai. 105 people died in the firing, forcing CM Morarji Desai to quit. With passions running high, it was only a matter of time before the new state came into being.On May 1, 1960, finally the State of Bombay was split into the Marathi-speaking Maharashtra and the Gujarati-speaking Gujarat.

The Shiv Sena was born in June 1966 out of a feeling of resentment about the continued “marginalisation” of Marathis despite creation of the new state. It attracted a large number of often-unemployed Maharashtrian youth and white collar Maharashtrian workers in PSUs, who were pulled towards Bal Thackeray’s charges of nepotism in PSUs, uncontrolled migration of labour into Mumbai, and lack of credit to Marathis.

Thackeray, then a cartoonist for The Free Press Journal, targeted the growing number of South Indians by inflammatory slogans like “lungi hatao pungi bajao” and “yendu gundu”. There was a string of attacks on the South Indian restaurant chain Udupi. Thackeray later also targeted Gujaratis, Marwaris, Biharis, and people from North India.

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