Nehru had called Sardar Patel total communist: Advani
New Delhi: LK Advani has quote a book to allege that then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru called his Home Minister a “total communalist” when the latter suggested that army be sent to take over a defiant Hyderabad after Independence.
The Nizam, who wanted to accede to Pakistan, had sent an emissary to the neighbouring country and transferred a huge sum of money to the government there. The Nizam’s officials were reportedly heaping atrocities on locals.
BJP has of late been trying to appropriate Sardar Patel as a leader close to the Hindutva ideology.
On Patel’s 138th anniversary on October 31, Advani had heaped praise on India’s first Home Minister at the inauguration of a project to build a 182 metre tall statue-the tallest in the world- of the leader.
Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, who is behind this endeavour, said India needs Patel’s secularism which united people and not the “votebank secularism” that is being practiced today. Both Advani and Modi have sought to fashion themselves as inheritors of Patel’s legacy.
