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The BJP’s insistence that historical past be rewritten with extra emphasis on Hindu kings who resisted Muslim invasion than on the invaders themselves has acquired a thumbs down from Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, whose JD(U) is the saffron celebration’s largest alliance associate. Kumar was requested in regards to the debate, particularly in educational circles, that has been triggered by the latest assertion of Union Residence Minister Amit Shah on the launch of a e-book on historical past written by a medical skilled.
How will you change historical past? Is it potential to take action, quipped Kumar with exclamatory laughter in reply to the query that was posed on the sidelines of his weekly public interplay programme right here on Monday. Though the septuagenarian dismissed the difficulty along with his curt reply, the message was loud and clear.
Historical past, by the way, has usually been the stick that the BJP and the JD(U) have used to beat one another with. Final 12 months, a BJP MLA Haribhushan Thakur Bachaul, who’s seen as a Hindutva hardliner, had come out with the suggestion that Bakhtiyarpur, a sleepy city on the outskirts of the state capital the place the chief minister was born, be renamed after the JD(U) chief.
Kumar had summarily rejected the suggestion terming it as faltu baat (garbage). Bakhtiyarpur is alleged to have been named after Bakhtiyar Khilji, the Twelfth-century Afghan basic who had marauded Bihar and Bengal and whose notorious exploits embrace the razing of the centre of upper studying at Nalanda the place Buddhists from far and large used to pursue their research. The JD(U), appeared intent on giving it again to its domineering coalition associate when the celebration’s parliamentary board chief Upendra Kushwaha carried out a sustained marketing campaign towards the alleged denigration of Emperor Asoka.
The legendary king of Magadha was the grandson of Chandragupta Maurya, who was born in a poor household of shepherds and went on to discovered the Maurya dynasty which the BJP additionally seeks to reminisce with quite a lot of nationalistic satisfaction. Nevertheless, due to Chandragupta Maurya’s humble origins, the king and his descendants have come to be seen as cultural icons of kind for the OBCs who dominate politics within the state.
Uttar Pradesh-based playwright Daya Prakash Sinha, who received chosen for the Sahitya Akademi award this 12 months, had stoked an issue by drawing a parallel between Asoka and Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, who’s reviled by the BJP and its ilk as a bigot. Sinha had contended that piety was utilized by each rulers as a cloak for his or her unbridled ambition, although unsurprisingly, the nuanced view discovered no takers within the political world.
Kushwaha raised a shrill marketing campaign, accusing Sinha of getting BJP hyperlinks and demanding withdrawal of the literary honour bestowed upon him. The BJP initially sought to purchase time however later misplaced its nerve and its state unit chief Sanjay Jaiswal lodged a police criticism accusing Sinha of falsely claiming to be related to the celebration after which giving it a nasty title by casting aspersions on Asoka the satisfaction of Bihar.
The controversy has, since, appeared to have been given a quiet burial. However the chief minister’s stance means that although his alliance with the BJP could also be coming into its fourth decade, ideological fault traces stay as pronounced as ever.
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