Rajasthan governor Kalyan Singh has done some blunt talking on Mughal ruler Akbar’s so-called greatness.
Kalyan Singh, commending the 16th century Hindu warrior-monarch of Mewar, said it was Pratap who was truly great, and not Akbar, who was an outsider.
“Akbar did no service to the nation. The suffix of ‘great’ should be dropped from his name,” Kalyan Singh said at the Bhamashah Samman Samaroh at Jaipur on Sunday, adding that the greatness of the Maharana had few parallels in Indian history.
Kalyan Singh, the BJP chief minister of Uttar Pradesh in the 1990s, said Akbar was an outsider who ruled over this country. The word “great” ought to be associated with Maharana Pratap, who was a son of the soil and dedicated his entire life for the freedom of this country and its people from alien rule.
Rajasthan’s governor was addressing a gathering on the life and times of Bhamashah, a wealthy businessman and close aide of Pratap, who donated his wealth to help Pratap rebuild his army after the Battle of Haldighati to continue the fight against the Mughals.
Kalyan Singh took a swipe at today’s school textbooks, saying they have no mention of Maharana’s greatness. “Our textbooks are flooded with chapters claiming Akbar was great. But the greatness of Pratap is nowhere in the textbooks, which is very unfortunate.”
Rajasthan education minister Vasudev Devnani, has repeatedly said he will strike out chapters on Akbar from the state’s textbooks. Kalyan Singh asked the minister to include chapters on Pratap’s valour, courage and honesty.
“Maharana Pratap’s instances of valor and his supreme sacrifice living in the forest and eating grass chapattis while defending the motherland should be taught to students,” said Kalyan, adding there ought to be statutes of Pratap and Bhamashah so that our new generations take inspiration from their lives.
Source : India Tomorrow
