TMC Rajya Sabha MP and former bureaucrat Jawhar Sircar called Prime Minister Narendra Modi “asura” while hitting out at External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar after his ANI interview. Dr Jaishankar on Tuesday had said that his father, Dr K Subrahmanyam was removed as Secretary of Defence Production by then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi after she returned to power in 1980.
Taking to Twitter, Jawhar Sircar wrote, “S Jaishankar’s father, K Subramanyam said “Dharma was killed in Gujarat (2002 Riots). Those who failed to protect innocent citizens are guilty of adharma. Rama…would have used his bow against the ‘Asura’ rulers of Gujarat.” Shame on son –serving Asura!”
Sircar had shared propaganda website The Wire link wherein their Founding Editor Siddharth Varadarajan had made a personal attack on Dr Jaishankar by invoking his deceased father’s critique of Narendra Modi as Gujarat CM during 2002 riots to score a brownie point over Soros ‘old man’ controversy. Varadarajan, who seems to have been hurt at Soros being called ‘old man’ for trying to interfere in India’s internal affairs and try foreign intervention in a bid to topple Modi government, appeared to have taken it upon himself to attack Jaishankar instead.
Sircar’s attack on Dr Jaishankar came after the External Affairs Minister in an interview with ANI, revealed that his father Dr K Subrahmanyam was removed as secretary, defence production by former PM Indira Gandhi in 1980 and that he was superseded during the Rajiv Gandhi period with someone junior to him becoming the Cabinet Secretary.
Jaishankar, in the interview with ANI, had explained the reason for joining the BJP as the right party at the right time for India’s progress. Insinuating at the External Affairs Minister, the TMC leader said Jaishankar was suffering from “amnesia” adding that he is just “cuddling up to the BJP.”
“Strange — that Jaishankar discovered his angst against the Gandhis — after serving them most loyally and taking the best of postings under them? Is it Amnesia or is he just cuddling up to BJP for his unprecedented promotion as Foreign Minister?” Sircar wrote on the microblogging site while sharing yet another news link to attack Dr Jaishankar.
The former head of State-run broadcaster Prasar Bharati, then raised the BBC bogey.
The British broadcaster released a documentary on PM Modi in January this year ahead of Lok Sabha elections next year. The propaganda documentary does not even mention the Godhra carnage where Muslim mob burnt alive Hindus returning from Ayodhya which triggered the riots. It mentions that the ‘train caught fire’ but does not specify a Muslim mob set it on fire with specific intentions to kill Hindus returning from Ayodhya.
So to answer Sircar’s question, the ‘facts’ in BBC documentary are false.
Jaishankar was Foreign Secretary from January 2015 to January 2018 and earlier served in key ambassadorial positions including in China and the United States. His father K Subrahmanyam, who passed away in 2011, is regarded as one of India’s most prominent national security strategists.
Sircar, on the other hand, likes to peddle fake news time and again. He was the Chief Executive Officer in Prasar Bharati from 2012 to 2016.
On April 27, 2014, Doordarshan aired a 30-minute-long interview with the then Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi in the runup to the Lok Sabha elections. Upon its release, a controversy broke out about how chunks of the 54-minute-long interview were edited out by broadcaster Prasar Bharti at the behest of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB).
At that point in time, Jawhar Sircar was the CEO of Prasar Bharati. Questions were raised about his integrity and the lack of autonomy of India’s largest public broadcasting agency. The interview, featuring former Gujarat CM and BJP’s PM candidate Narendra Modi was shot on April 26, 2014, and it aired a day later on April 27. It was followed up with a re-telecast of the interview on April 28. When the video was aired, the BJP raised objection as to how a 54-minute-long interview was cut short to just 30 minutes.
