The issue of publication of a cartoon of B. R. Ambedkar in an NCERT book threatened to snowball into a crisis with BSP chief Mayawati on Friday declaring she will not allow Parliament to function if action was not taken against those responsible for the act within three days.
“This is an insult to Indian democracy. The government should intervene and take strong action against those, who are involved in this. If it failed to do so, we will wait for two to three days or else our party will not allow the House to run,” Ms. Mayawati told reporters outside Parliament.
HRD Ministry later said that the government has ordered removal of the cartoon from the NCERT textbooks.
Members of her party forced adjournments in both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha over the issue and disallowed HRD Minister Kapil Sibal from making a statement.
LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan also slammed the publication as “highly deplorable”.
He said that those who have made this kind of cartoon and also those who endorsed it should not only be suspended but should be booked under the SC/ST act.
Wondering how can such objectionable material creep into NCERT books, a visibly angry Paswan said, “NCERT should be closed down.”
Keywords: Ambedkar cartoon row, NCERT books
We should know that it is because of Dr. B.R.Ambedkar's relentless scholarly effort our great secular, modern and democratic constitution came into existence. 80% Dalit Bahujans felt hurt to see such kind of cartoons. Stalling the parliament is not the first time with this issue. It has been done on so many petty issue. You elite/upper caste guys will never try to respect the feelings, sentiments and images of the Dalit Bahujan leaders and people. Here issue is not about corruption, if it is so start with thousands of upper caste politicians and business people who have exploited this nation.
Yes, it is quite surprising that a dalit lady who has amassed wealth
during her tenure as CM and spent 87 crores to renovate the
bunglow,never bothered about the upliftment of the dalits now says she
will stall the proceedings. She has misapprropriated the funds allotted
to the improvement and still she dares to challenge in the name of a
cartoon issue.She is the first lady to be put behind bars and a through
investigation is made about her amassing wealth.Will the Govt.do it?
As already said by many, it is a 1949 cartoon and i dont see any issues with it. Government should not be forced upon or threatened by such mindless acts.
"If you bend over once, you will have to do it for life"
A cartoon apt for the day. It described the political situation with humor. That is the
job of a cartoonist. I am sure Mr. Ambedkar would have had a smile.
I hate to see these morons *ban* all cartoons now.
Its an insult to me and million Indians when MPs stall the work of Parliament over issues like cartoons. In 1949 when Jawahar Lal Nehru and Dr. Ambedkar never had a problem with this cartoons then why its even an issue today? Elected representatives should understand that more harm to the image of great men are done by the actions of their followers rather than cartoons. Its a serious issue and day by day Indian Polititians are hurting the democratic rights of Indians under the guise of Pseudo-Democracy which suits their ideology... Its a tragedy that The Indian political thinking is going to dark ages rather than living up to the aspiration of 21st century...
“This is an insult to Indian democracy."
Look who says!
Ms Mayawati who got her statues erected out all over UP out of public money. Not to mention Rs 5,700-crore national rural health mission (NRHM) scam, 25,000-crore scandal in the selling about two dozen state-run sugar mills to private houses ...
The list continues!
Looks like Ms Mamta has lot of supporters in Parliament.
Yes, Mayawati needs to do this to distract the attention of public from the 86 crores of tax money that she spent to renovate her bungalow!
She is worried on a cartoon...There are far bigger and humongous issues
in hand.
Why don't they stall the house to build Food stocks for the grains that
are stored in open area or for bringing a strong Lok-Pal...
They are fooling us...and we all get easily fooled.
I am wishing for the day when there will be no CASTE in India and these CASTE BASED POLITICIANS will have nothing to do then !!!! But i know in my life time it is not going to happen....though i am optimist because i am still 25. Yes, Anybody who made mockery of father of Indian constitution should be punished, but in democratic way. Not in an undemocratic way e.g. stalling parliament house or abolishing NCERT !!!
What is not deplorable is, 1) Spending 86 crores on an individual's house, 2)
spending even more on memorials exhorting individual virtues, 3) threatening to
disrupt the House instead of having a mature debate on what the cartoon portrays
and whether it should be there.
Was depiction of Ambedkar in cartoon form the insult or the content of the cartoon insulting?
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