NEW DELHI : Culture minister Mahesh Sharma on Monday told Lok Sabha, the government has not found any evidence that the Taj Mahal in Agra was a Hindu temple. In a written reply on a declaratory suit filed in an Agra court that Taj Mahal be declared a Hindu temple with right to worship for Hindus, Sharma said government is aware of the suit. On a specific query about the evidence of it being Hindu, minister replied in the negative. He also said that so far government has not observed any affect on tourism because of the controversy.
In another question on writers returning Sahitya Akademi awards, Sharma said, “The return of the awards is stated to be in protest against the recent mishappenings against the writers etc.” However, he did not mention specific instance of ‘mishappenings.’ He said Sahitya Akademi had convened a special executive board meeting that passed a resolution “condemning the attack on and murder of any writer or artist and requesting the writers, who had returned the awards, to reconsider their decision.”
Sharma gave out a list of 39 writers who have returned their Sahitya Akademi award and one artist who had returned his Lalit Kala Akademi award. The list includes writers like Uday Prakash, Ashok Vajpeyi, Krishna Sobti, Mangalesh Dabral, G N Devy, Anil Joshi, Aman Sethi, Sara Joseph, Mohan Bhandari, Chaman Lal, G N Ranganath Rao, Ibrahim Afghan, Mandakranta Sen and others.
Source : Times Of India
