Nervous Govt now chants ‘Ram naam’ [Link]
A deeply embarrassed government has decided to withdraw from its affidavit in the Ram Setu case the portion which said there is no historical and scientific evidence to establish the existence of Lord Ram or other characters of the Ramayana. The government will file a supplementary affidavit in the Supreme Court on Friday.
The top Congress leadership has also sought details on the movement of the file. It ostensibly emanated from the ASI and traveled via the ministry of culture, where it should have been studied by minister Ambika Soni (currently in Japan). Then it went to the law ministry headed by HR Bhardwaj. “Somebody has played mischief or has been grossly derelict,” said a source.
On Thursday, Bhardwaj told reporters, “Ram is an integral part of our history and culture. Ram ki vajah se saari duniya exist karti hai. It is an article of faith and cannot be made a matter of litigation.”
Bhardwaj quoted liberally from scriptures to negate the impression that his party is anti-Hindu as its adversaries would make it out to be.
But the minister sidestepped the twin questions of fixing responsibility for the mishap and whether Ram Setu was or wasn’t, as claimed by the original affidavit-a man-made structure. “I am not authorised to take action,” he said to the first query. As for the second, he said that it was for the Court to go into the merits of the case.
This is not the first time that the government has messed up things. It did so when it did not advise Sonia Gandhi on the office of profit issue when she became the National Advisory Council (NAC) chairperson.
It happened again when George Fernandes was given a clean chit on the defence deals scam. At that time, the Law Ministry claimed that it was not consulted when, sources said, it had in fact been consulted on the matter. An angry Pranab Mukherjee, then defence minister, reportedly even threatened to quit at the time.
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