Hindu Mahasabha’s bid to install Godse busts draws flak

Chennai: The state unit of All India Hindu Mahasabha (AIHM) has decided to install the bust of Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin Nathuram Godse across the state. The Sangh Parivar group’s decision has been condemned by BJP ally PMK. AIHM national vice-president Rakesh Ranjan told reporters in Dindigul on Thursday that his organisation would submit a petition to the state government seeking allocation of land for erecting Godse busts.

“If the government does not allot land, we will move a petition before the court. If nothing works out, we will install busts on the land owned by our members,” he said. Mr Ranjan said that the Mahasabha would also hold meetings in various part of the South India to create awareness on the freedom fighters whose names were given a burial by the Congress-led governments at the Centre.

Terming the AIHM’s demand for installing busts of Godse a national insult, BJP’s ally PMK urged the Central and state governments to nip it off in the bud. “If the bust of Godse is installed there can be no bigger national insult.,” PMK founder S. Ramadoss said in a statement here. He said that even talking about erection of statue for a person who testified that he killed Mahatma for acting against the interest of Hindus should be considered as anti-national and an act of treason.

 Referring to a meet of the Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha at Dindigul which resolved to install busts of Godse, he said this was very dangerous. “Installation of Godse’s busts will create communal disharmony in the state as well as country,” he noted. Hitting out at the BJP, he said Hindutva outfits had begun efforts to realise their long-term goals with the “indirect support” of the rulers at the Centre.