MP: BJYM booklet terms Jawaharlal Nehru greedy, Congress hits back

More than 26 lakh school students appeared for the examination conducted across the state on Tuesday. They had been given the 49-page booklet that has 230 objective-type questions and chapters devoted to introduction of the ideologue, his philosophy of integral humanism, religion and concept of Antyodaya, among other things.

Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan spoke at Bhopal and Jabalpur, two of the venues where the examination was held. The booklet carries messages by BJP chief Amit Shah, the CM, and BJYM president Poonam Mahajan.
Most questions in the booklet are devoted to the BJP, the RSS, the schemes launched by BJP governments in Madhya Pradesh and at the Centre. It also has a page with photographs of Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Rabindranath Tagore, Babasaheb Ambedkar, Rani Laxmibai, Subhas Chandra Bose, Rani Durgavati, Bhagat Singh, Madan Mohan Malviya, RSS ideologue M S Golvalkar, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Lala Lajpat Rai, Tantya Bhil, Ashfaqulla Khan and Sarojini Naidu.

Some of the questions in the booket were: Who was the first prime minister from BJP; who founded Jan Sangh and the RSS; where’s the headquarters of the RSS and who was the chief minister when Bhopal gas tragedy occurred.

The Congress slammed the examination and the reference to Nehru as a conspiracy to mislead the youth of the country. “The BJP and the RSS had no role in the freedom movement. The party has spent crores on lionising Deendayal Upadhyay who did not play any role in the freedom movement or nation-building unlike Nehru,’’ said Leader of Opposition in Assembly Ajay Singh.

BJYM’s MP unit chief Abhilash Pande, who said the competition was his brainchild, said the reference to greed was for Jinnah and not Nehru. Another BJP leader blamed the mistake on proofreading. The morcha claimed that 26.5 lakh students took part in Madhya Pradesh and nearly 3.98 lakh students from 40 countries appeared in the examination online.