Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Feb 25: The Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR), an autonomous body under the Union Ministry of Education, which had recently hit the headlines for its appeal to celebrate February 14 as the “Cow Hug Day” instead of western romantic “Valentine’s Day,” and had to eat its own words within 24 hours, is in the news again for another wrong reason.
For the last six months or so, the ICHR had introduced a practice of its staff singing the national anthem the first thing after gathering in the morning every day. But all of a sudden the practice was stopped on Friday without assigning any reason.
In addition to the national anthem, another uncommon practice prevailed in the office of the ICHR was that walls of two of its office rooms hang images of “Bharat Mata” and of Deen Dayal Upadhyaya, the founder of the erstwhile Bharatiya Jan Sangh, the precursor of the present ruling party, the BJP. The images of Bharat Mata and of Upadhyaya adorned the walls of the ICHR conference room and the office of its member secretary Umesh Kadam.
The official sources admitted that along with stopping the practice of singing national anthem, the images of Bharat Mata and of Upadhyaya were also removed from both the rooms. There were no written orders either for starting the national anthem since September, last year, or for the installation of the images of Bharat Mata and Upadhyaya, nor was any such written orders issued for stopping the national anthem and removal of the images since Friday.
According to a senior official: “The singing of the national anthem started based on a verbal order last September and stopped today, also on a verbal order. There was no written order to remove images of Bharat Mata and Upadhyaya but these were removed today from both places.”
Official sources said the steps were taken after some “objections” but did not elaborate objections to what. While there cannot be any objection to the practice of singing national anthem, which should rather be encouraged in other institutions as well, or the installation of the image of “Bharat Mata,” some objections apparently were raised over placing the image of a political party leader in a government organisation.
ICHR chairman Raghuvendra Tanwar and Member Secretary Kadam both confirmed the developments but refused to elaborate. Sources said in both the rooms, images of Bharat Mata and Upadhyaya were on the wall with pictures of President Draupadi Murmu and Prime Minister Narendra Modi as is the practice in all the government offices.
Asked about the images of Bharat Mata and Upadhyaya, Kadam said, “There was no written order (to put these images). People come and present such things and we install them at an appropriate place.” Apparently, the national anthem was sung by staff at 10 am each day in front of the ICHR library. Kadam insisted that the singing of the national anthem was “voluntary.”
Sources said that the singing of the anthem began after Kadam joined ICHR on August 11 last year. Tanwar said: “It is true that there was no proper permission (for images and national anthem). Neither from the (Governing) Council, nor from me. have no role in the removal of the images or stopping the national anthem. ICHR is a non-sectarian body. We have to maintain its sanctity,” he said. Apparently the reference was to the image of the leader of a political party which is never allowed in a government office.
Kadam was teaching, most recently at Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University as Professor (Chair Medieval Indian History) where he has also been Dean of Student’s Welfare. Tanwar, Professor Emeritus, Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra, was nominated as Chairman of the ICHR in January last year. His latest work “The Story of India’s Partition” was published in 2021 by the Government of India in both English and Hindi.
Established in March 1972, the primary aim of ICHR, according to its mission statement, is to “foster objective and scientific writing of history.” The ICHR was recently in the news for issuing an appeal to the people of the country, and more specifically the youths, to shun “Valentine’s Day” and celebrate February 14 as the “Cow Hug Day.” But was forced to withdraw the appeal within 24 hours after instructions from the government.
