Mangalore, Feb 3: The BJP government in the state is very clear in its stand that it will not allow any government to establish a university for minorities in Karnataka named after Tipu Sultan, said Minister for Higher Education C T Ravi. However, the state government does not have any objection with regard to establishing a central or national university named any Muslim who is far more nationalistic or secular than Tipu Sultan.
Addressing media persons at a press conference here on Sunday, he said that if the union government came forward to set up a central or national university in Srirangapatna, the state government would sanction any amount of land for the same. But on the other hand, a minorities university after any name will not be allowed or tolerated. The tag of 'minority' was brought by the British and establishing a university for them would be dangerous.
“The BJP, however, is not against a Muslim name and BJP will fully cooperate if it is named after worthy and non-controversial Muslims such as former President A P J Abdul Kalam, shehnai maestro Bismillah Khan or Abdul Hamid who sacrificed his life in the 1965 Indo-Pakistan War” he said.
“Aspects of Tipu's contributions and controversies have been documented and recorded by historians, not established by the BJP or RSS, as proclaimed by others. Although few aspects of the ruler's contributions are acclaimed, there are other aspects that are controversial, and we do not advocate the naming of a central university after him,” he said, adding that the controversial aspects of the ruler had to be debated.
Taking on the Congress, he said that the 'padayatra' undertaken from Ullal to Udupi for political reasons by Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee leaders had failed due to lack of support from people.
“The party has lost the morality to preach lessons against corruption at public meetings, especially when the Congress-led UPA government itself has produced a string of recently-exposed scams worth crores of rupees such as coal-block allocation, 2G spectrum and CWG, as cited by CAG reports. Several scams have taken place under the Congress rule right from the time when Jawaharlal Nehru was the Prime Minister of India. If the Congress party has any sincerity or courage, let them uncover the facts before the public,” he challenged lashing out at the Congress for threatening to put RSS leader Kalladka Prabhakar Bhat behind bars, whom he termed as 'a true patriot' who opposed vote-bank politics and terrorism. Making statements of imprisoning people like him are just tactics of Congress to attract votes, he said.
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