Chief minister Mamata Banerjee
on Thursday appealed to “all lovers of Bengal’s civilisation” to protest
“a bigger lie” by BJP that Rabindranath Tagore had been born at
Visva-Bharati.
She was referring to the BJP Bengal unit’s official
Twitter handle issuing a tweet on Wednesday with a quote, attributing it
to the party’s national president J.P. Nadda, stating that Tagore, one
of the foremost Bengali icons, had been born in Visva-Bharati.
Addressing
the culmination event of the Trinamul Congress’s three-day sit-in near
Gandhi statue in Calcutta on Thursday in favour of the nationwide
farmers’ agitation, Mamata said: “Such mega liars, let me give you one
example…. Their (the BJP’s) babus held a meeting even yesterday
(Wednesday) and said Rabindranath Tagore was supposedly born in
Visva-Bharati, at Santiniketan. Tell me, what can be a bigger lie, a
bigger attempt to alter history?”
But by then, many netizens and
Trinamul Congress had noticed it, and taken screenshots of the faux pas
for circulation. “He was born in 1861 and Visva-Bharati came into being
60 years later. If he was born there, what about Jorasanko Thakurbari
(Tagore’s actual birthplace in Calcutta)?” the Trinamul supremo asked.
“Those who can come up with such gigantic lies about even Rabindranath
Tagore, what do you expect them to do about you and me? They have shamed
Bengal…. I appeal to all lovers of Bengal’s civilisation, culture…
members of the civil society, everyone… protest, resist, roar,” she
said.
“Demand answers. Changing Tagore’s birthplace, smashing
Vidyasagar’s statue, wrongly identifying Birsa Munda… this brand of fake
politics cannot go on for long,” said the Trinamul chief.
Such
incidents have allowed Mamata to portray the BJP as the bohiragawto
(outsider) trying to invade and ruin Bengal, a charge that has become a
staple of her speeches in the run-up to next year’s Assembly polls.
“You
had planned the Vidyasagar vandalism…. Will not tolerate every lie.
Enough is enough. Tagore’s birthplace, the controversy the BJP has
created, the malicious propaganda…. They are manipulators and violators
of history. Trying to attack the very backbone of Bengal and its
culture,” said Mamata, ordering her party to take this to the people
during a 10-day outreach exercise at the grassroots from Friday.
“Bishwokobi
(Tagore), forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing,” she
added, in a Biblical reference. “They want to eliminate Bengal from
India.”A minister said Mamata would increasingly weave such elements
into her campaign against the BJP and refer to attempts to deify
“controversial” figures that the saffron ecosystem considers iconic —
such as Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, Syama Prasad Mookerjee and Deendayal
Upadhyaya — often at the cost of more widely accepted icons with
inclusive, secular philosophies, such as Tagore and Netaji Subhas
Chandra Bose.
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