NEW DELHI, March 25: The Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Friday offered all infrastructural support including providing land in his state for the construction of a “genocide museum.”
He was responding to a proposal made by Vivek Agnihotri, the director of the box-office hit film “The Kashmir Files” depicting the sufferings of the Kashmiri Pandits on being hunted out of their homes in Jammu and Kashmir in the early nineties.
“It is a wonderful proposal–to construct a ‘Genocide Museum’. The state government will provide land and extend all its support. You also spoke of humanism. We wish people, after visiting this museum, would strive to become better human beings, turning towards love and away from hate,” Chouhan said.
Agnihotri, who was in Bhopal for the three-day Chitra Bharti Film Festival at Makhanlal Chaturvedi National University of Journalism and Communication, met the chief minister before the event started. They planted two saplings at the Smart City Park in the presence of a few Kashmiri Pandits.
The filmmaker described Chouhan as the “only person in the world” who plants a sapling a day. He thanked the chief minister for making his film tax-free in the state and requested that the two saplings be named “Shiv” and “Sharada” after the names of film’s characters. At Chouhan’s request, a third was named after Jana Sangh founder Shyama Prasad Mukherjee.
Agnihotri tweeted later, “Our IAM Buddha Foundation & Global KP Diasporia were working to build a Genocide Museum. Today, when I requested CM Chouhan about it, he instantly granted land & logistical support. This will be fully funded by us & the people. It will be a symbol of Humanity.”
“We want this Genocide Museum to showcase Indian values of humanity and vishwa kalyan. This museum will also showcase how terrorism destroys humanity,” he added.
(Manas Dasgupta)