After his claim that India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, hated Lord Somnath the most and that Nehru did not want the rebuilding of Somnath temple after Independence due to his blind appeasement politics, BJP national spokesperson Sudhanshu Trivedi clarified that he has no personal animosity towards the former PM.
He, however, claimed that Nehru's ideology was "terrible and frightening" for India.
"Just as PM Narendra Modi is not merely an individual, but an institution, Jawaharlal Nehru is not just a leader, but a symbol of an ideology, and it is necessary to understand today how terrible and frightening that ideology was for India, and how much it was concealed behind a veil of deception," news agency ANI quoted him as saying.
He said it is sad that in April 1951, Nehru wrote a letter to the then prime minister of Pakistan, Liaquat Ali Khan, addressing him as “my dear Nawabjade”, stating that the story of the gates of the Somnath temple being brought back to India was completely false.
According to the book 'Maharaja Ranjit Singh' by L. S. Bakshi, officially published by the Congress government, the government notes that Ranjit Singh made no distinction between Hindus and Sikhs among his subjects when the combined forces of the East India Company and defeated Shah Shuja in Kabul.
"Pay attention to this further point: When they captured Kabul, one of the terms inserted by Maharaja Ranjit Singh in the treaty that followed was that the doors of the Somnath temple, planted there by Mahmud Ghazni, should be returned to India. Now, is Maharaja Ranjit Singh right, or is Jawaharlal Nehru, who was busy catering to Liaquat Ali's whims, telling the truth," he sought to know.
He pointed out that a second reference comes from K. M. Panikkar, who was India’s ambassador to Communist China at the time.
"If any of you have read in the books, the letter Panikkar wrote to Nehru had the sentiment that they should find out how Chairman Mao would feel about it. What affection they have for the Maoists who consider religion as opium, and how close and affectionate they are towards the Muslim League, and how they are bringing down the hammer on Hindu sentiments, and this mindset remains unchanged even today...The same mentality that prevailed back then is visible today," he claimed.
