Hindu Mahasabha launches website eulogising Godse
Leaders of the Akhil Bhartiya Hindu Mahasabha (ABHM) and its frontal organisation Vishwa Hindu Peeth organised a ritual on Sunday at its offices in Meerut and launched a website to commemorate the death anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin Nathuram Godse, who was hanged on November 15, 1948.
Godse has been a polarising figure with organisations on the far-right hailing him as a hero while secular organisations and parties such as the Congress have protested attempts to celebrate the legacy of the man who killed Gandhi.
ABHM’ s national general secretary Munna Kumar Sharma, patron Ashok Sharma, Viswa Hindu Peeth’s national president Acharya Madanji, Nathuram Godse Brigade president Swami Omji, Mahasabha’s city president Bharat Rajput, district president Abhishek Aggarwal and many other leaders and activists took part in the rituals in the presence of police.
The rituals were held with banners hailing a ‘Hindu rashtra’ (Hindu nation) in the background.
The website www.nathuramgodse.in has been designed by the IT cell of Vishwa Hindu Peeth, said Acharya Madanji as he unveiled it.
“The objective of the website is to make people aware about Godse and the facts behind assassination of Gandhi”, he added.
“Godse was not a criminal”, said Sharma, emphasising that people must know his statement recorded in the court after his arrest on charges of assassinating Gandhi.
“He sacrificed his life at the age of 39 and we call him a criminal”, he said and criticised the Modi government for deviating from its agenda “after coming to power in the name of Hindutva”. The Mahasabha, one of the oldest Hindu organisations, is not connected to the Sangh Parivar to which the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party belongs. Mahasabha demanded that “true facts behind Gandhi’s assassination” be included in the syllabus of schools. “It would help students understand the circumstances which lead to Gandhi’s assassination,” said Abhishek Aggarwal, Mahasbah’s city president. Mahasabha leaders had ruffled feathers in political circles last year in December when they made a futile attempt to install a statue of Nathuram Godse at its office premises. Police then sealed the disputed site and the Mahasabha filed a petition in the High Court against the district administration for preventing them from installing the statute.