On Thursday, Union Home Minister Amit Shah encouraged scholars to conduct studies and write about 30 great Indian civilizations and 300 soldiers who fought valiantly for the motherland. He said that no one can stop rewriting of history to free it from distortions.
“I often come across complaints that our history has been distorted and tampered with. These allegations could be true. But who stops it from being corrected now? Who stops us from writing the correct history now,” the Minister said while speaking at the event that was organised to mark the 400th Birth Anniversary of Ahom general Lachit Barphukan in Delhi.
Speaking at the programme to mark the 400th Birth Anniversary of legendary Lachit Barphukan. #400YearsOfLachitBarphukan https://t.co/c55nw5ZBOc
— Amit Shah (@AmitShah) November 24, 2022
He hailed the Ahom general and said that North East would not have been part of India if Veer Lachit Barphukan had not fought for it. “He protected not only Northeast India but entire Southeast Asia from religious fanatic Aurangzeb,” he said.
Shah urged researchers, historians, and students to recognize 30 great civilizations in Indian history that governed for more than 150 years in any part of the country, as well as 300 warriors who demonstrated exemplary courage in fighting for the country’s independence and conducting extensive study and writing about them.
“If we do this, we will see that the true history of India will be established and the lies will end spontaneously. In India, we now have a government that supports any endeavour to promote the country’s glory. We will work towards reviving India’s glorious history,” Shah said at the event organised by the Assam government.
I urge our historians and students of history to identify 30 great empires in Indian history and 300 warriors who showed exemplary valour to protect the motherland and write extensively about them.
— Amit Shah (@AmitShah) November 24, 2022
This will bring out the truth and the lies will vanish on their own. pic.twitter.com/2yNPhfQtop
Shah stated that a country that does not take pride in its magnificent history and does not draw inspiration from its ancestors would never be able to establish a bright future for itself, better citizens, or a golden future.
The minister said Barphukan fought the Saraighat fight in difficult conditions by bringing together many tribes and using local resources to create tiny weaponry and boats to take on the powerful army headed by Ram Singh of Amer. “The Mughal army did not have that iota of patriotism and dedication for the country that Barphukan and his soldiers had. This was a victory of patriotism. They won and not only secured the sovereignty, culture and heritage of Ahom but also saved entire Southeast Asia from religiously fanatic invader Aurangzeb,” he said.
He said that the foreign invaders from Delhi could never have the confidence to enter Assam again after this shattering setback. He went on to say that the 400th birth anniversary of Lachit Borphukan reveals a fresh chapter in Indian history in which Assam kings battled Muslim invaders of different ages and preserved their motherland’s sovereignty.
Assam was attacked 22 times by Muslim invaders between 1206 and 1671 but could not remain under Muslim rule for long due to its people’s unwavering desire for freedom, Shah said. He stated that the Northeast’s culture had survived due to this mindset. Its magnificent location, language, culture, clothing, music, and food have all remained unaffected by foreign influences.
He said that everyone, whether Akbar or Aurangzeb, Qutb ud-Din Aibak or Iltutmish, Bakhtiyar Khalji or Iwaz Khali, Muhammad bin Tughluq or Mir Jumla, had been defeated in Assam by the heroism of Ahom Kings. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, former Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, former Chief Justice of India and Rajya Sabha MP Ranjan Gogoi were among those who were present at the session along with Home Minister Shah in Delhi on November 24.
Author Vikram Sampath faced online attacks and ridicule for his objective account of Veer Savarkar’s life
Shah’s assertion comes at a time when many Indian historians have come under attack from the left intelligentsia for refusing to toe the established version of decades-old distortionists who peddled a coloured version of India’s history to promote their agenda. For instance, famous author and historian Vikram Sampath was subjected to ridicule and attack for publishing his seminal work on freedom fighter Veer Savarkar, one of the earliest proponents of Hindutva ideology, long maligned by the Congress party for political purposes.
Even before his treatise on Savarkar was out in the market, Congress supporters and trolls attacked the author and accused him of whitewashing history with his prejudice for the leader. However, undeterred by criticism, Sampath went ahead with his books on Savarkar and provided an accurate account of the freedom fighter’s life, dispelling sundry notions that erstwhile historians had promoted to jibe with the political ideology of the time.
