Union minister for defence Rajnath Singh (PTI photo)
NEW DELHI: Defence minister Rajnath Singh on Wednesday stood by his statement that Pt Jawahar Lal Nehru had wanted to rebuild the Babri mosque with public money, with his office issuing documentary evidence to support his claim, which was rebutted by Congress and other opposition parties.Singh had made the claim while addressing a gathering at Sadhli village in Gujarat’s Vadodara district on Tuesday. Responding to it, Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said the claim was aimed at diverting attention from real issues that need to be discussed.“Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel was truly secular… When Pt Jawaharlal Nehru spoke about spending govt funds on the Babri masjid issue, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel opposed it. At that time, he did not allow the Babri masjid to be built with govt money. Nehru ji raised the question of reconstruction of the Somnath temple… Sardar clarified that the Somnath temple case was different; the public had donated Rs 30 lakh there, a trust had been formed, and not even a single penny of govt money was used. Ram mandir in Ayodhya has not been funded by govt money. The entire cost has been borne by the people of this country,” Singh said.The defence minister drew the information from Inside Story of Sardar Patel (The diary of Maniben Patel 1936-50), a book authored by Prabha Chopra. It was published in 2011 when Congress was in governance, and Nehru Memorial Library has a copy of the book. It is based on the diary of Maniben Patel, the daughter of Sardar Patel. The senior BJP neta’s office shared excerpts of the book to “validate” his claim.Congress, however, termed Rajnath’s claim a “lie” and “WhatsApp university story”, and said he should not tread PM Narendra Modi’s path. “These are all distractions. There are many other real issues that need to be discussed. They create a new distraction every day so that we are unable to discuss the real issues of the people,” Vadra told reporters.Asked about the issue at a press conference, Congress’ media and publicity department head Pawan Khera said, “We would like to tell the defence minister — ‘aap toh aise na the’ (you weren’t like this). We can understand others, the PM is very learned, we can understand him making such statements… show us evidence.” Congress’ whip in Lok Sabha Manickam Tagore said it is very surprising to see Rajnath “running these kinds of fake news factories and WhatsApp university stories”.
