Arun Jaitley terms protest of returning awards as ‘manufactured rebellion’

New Delhi: In a major development that shows the intelligentsia is clearly “deserting” the Narendra Modi government, historians on Thursday joined writers, filmmakers and scientists in growing protests against the “climate of intolerance” over which top scientist P.M. Bhargava said that he would return his Padma Bhushan.

Finance minister Arun Jaitley, stepping up his attack on those returning awards, called them ‘rabid anti-BJP elements’ and said that the protest was a ‘manufactured rebellion’.