Kollam/ Thiruvananthapuram: Prime Minister Narendra Modi's efforts to link the duo of the late chief minister R Sankar and Nair patriarch Mannthu Padmanabhan and Jan Sangh founder Syama Prasad Mookerjee have provoked a hail of protests.
Sankar's son Mohan Sankar and daughter S Sasikumari, strongly disapproving of BJP's moves to "misappropriate" Sankar's legacy, joined in a protest prayer meeting organized by Congress and boycotted the Sankar memorial unveiling in Kollam on Tuesday.
Mohan Sankar, 69, the chairman of Kerala State Backward Classes Development Corporation, said the exclusion of the Chief Minister from the statue unveiling after inviting him was a big insult. Sankar is the SNDP Kollam district union president.
He said an RSS newspaper calling Sankar a 'swayam sevak' deeply hurt him. "Such act of linking Sankar with RSS is condemnable", he said.
Sasikumari told DC that she felt happy and contented being able to attend the prayer meeting in front of Sankar's statue at Palayam. Sasikumari, who lives at Kunnukuzhi, near here, said she cherished fond memories of her father who died of a heart attack at the age of 63 years.
Sasikumari, 72, who worked as an English lecturer for two years when her father was alive, quit her job after marrying Dr Babu Subhash. She has been a homemaker but closely followed SNDP developments and politics in general.
CPM politburo member Pinarayi Vijayan said Mr Modi's attempt was to distort history. Left fellow-traveller Cheriyan Philip said Sankar had never been a Sangh bandhu and "to misinterpret his personal association with S P Mookerjee even before the latter had founded Jan Sangh was wrong".
"Mannthu Padmanabhan and Sankar formed Hindu Mandalam in 1949 for the protection of temples- Mannam was Devaswom Board president and Sankar a member. S P Mookerjee was then a member of the Nehru Ministry and Sankar might have met him and invited him. Modi has misinterpreted this as Sankar's affinity towards Jan Sangh. A Gandhi bhakt like Sankar could never have allied himself with the RSS, which was banned following the assassination of the Mahatma.
"Sankar was then a Congress member in Travancore-Kochi Assembly. Later he became KPCC president and the Chief Minister. By describing Sankar as a Hindutva follower and Jan Sangh sympathiser was an affront to his political legacy.
"Modi was trying to cloak Sankar in saffron. Sankar was always secular. By stretching the same logic, Mr Modi might paint the late A K Gopalan as a Hindu Mahasabha leader for participating in Vaikom satyagraha", said Mr Philip in his FB post.
Download the all new Deccan Chronicle app for Android and iOS to stay up-to-date with latest headlines and news stories in politics, entertainment, sports, technology, business and much more from India and around the world.
