Chandigarh: The President of the Shiromani Akali Dal (Badal) and former Deputy Chief Minister of the State Sukhbir Badal on Thursday shot off a letter to Indian Prime Minister Narinder Modi in which he has requested him to intervene and nip an attempt to create communal disharmony by some mischievous elements who wanted to rename the Dyal Singh Evening College, Delhi as Vande Matram college.
I have urged PM Narendra Modi to intervene to nip attempts to create communal tension by renaming Dyal Singh College as Vande Matram College pic.twitter.com/8eLvcnLs9P
— Sukhbir Singh Badal (@officeofssbadal) November 23, 2017
In a letter to the Prime Minister, Sukhbir Badal said that it is entirely needless and dangerous controversy over the renaming of the Dyal Singh College as it would only bring a bad name to the country’s democratic and secular society. Further he said that there were countless institutions in the country being run in the name of Sardar Bhagat Singh, Mahatama Gandhi and others and no one could think of replacing these names with Vande Matram even though one could stretch logic mischievously to justify this step.
I have urged PM Narendra Modi to intervene to nip attempts to create communal tension by renaming Dyal Singh College as Vande Matram College pic.twitter.com/8eLvcnLs9P
— Sukhbir Singh Badal (@officeofssbadal) November 23, 2017
“It would be hard to understand the rationale or the mindset behind such moves, as it is behind the move to change the name of Dyal Singh College” Sukhbir Badal further said in his statement.
Whilst being flattering about Dyal Singh Majithia, Sukhbir Badal said that ” was a great philanthropist–patriot who had willed his estate in 1895 for the establishment of an educational trust. The Dyal Singh College was established at Lahore in 1910. After the Partition of the Indian Sub-Continent, Dyal Singh College was established in Karnal and Delhi. It started functioning in the capital as a constituent college of the University of Delhi in 1959 and was taken over by the University of Delhi as a university maintained institution in 1978.”
Furthermore, SAD (Badal) president also dubbed so-called “Vande Mataram” as sacred expression and maintained that this had the potential to blow up into a major controversy and conflict in the country. Moreover, he claimed that the expression Vande Matram evoked spontaneous emotional patriotic fervor in the minds of every Indian and it must be kept beyond the realm of petty political controversies.