Spatikapuri Mutt pontiff Nanjavadutha Swami on Monday chose a government event to slam the ruling BJP for appointing writer Rohith Chakratirtha as head of the textbook revision committee.
This was the first time that a seer from one of Karnataka’s prominent mutts chose a government platform to speak out on the textbooks controversy.
The Nanjavadutha Swami, who represents a mutt from the dominant Vokkaliga community, was speaking at the 513th birth anniversary of Nadaprabhu Kempegowda, the founder of Bengaluru, at Vidhana Soudha here. He said the government should not appoint people with a left or right-leaning ideology to revise school textbooks.
"Those who revise textbooks should have poise and be knowledgeable to see everything with a mindset of deep research," he said.
“We have seen sadistic social media posts comparing the Kannada flag to clothing (shorts) by the person who was appointed to the committee to revise textbooks,” the pontiff said, referring to Chakratirtha.
The pontiff urged Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai to take necessary measures to uphold the dignity of social reformers like Basavanna, B R Ambedkar, Kempegowda and Kuvempu, icons who are said to have been either “distorted” or “downsized” in the new textbooks.
During the event, the government presented the inaugural Kempegowda International Awards to veteran politician S M Krishna, IT pioneer N R Narayana Murthy and badminton ace Prakash Padukone. Infosys Foundation chairperson Sudha Murty received the award on behalf of Narayana Murthy, whereas Padukone’s award was collected by former national badminton coach Vimal Kumar.
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