Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not show up at Vijay Ghat when Lal Bahadur Shastri’s birth anniversary was being observed on Friday morning. The absence was questioned on social media and the “ModiDisrespectsShashtri” hashtag trended on Twitter. For many observers, it meant Mr. Shastri was not important enough for the BJP government.
And for Congress leaders, it was another piece of evidence to prove that the BJP was consistent in erasing the names of Congress icons from the public memory. Lal Bahadur Shastri’s grandson Vibhakar Shashtri told The Hindu that a few months after the BJP came to power in 2014, the Urban Development Ministry decided not to fund his grandfather’s birth anniversary. “For no reason whatsoever,” Vibhakar said. “The Ministry withdrew its support to this event. My grandfather gave his life for this country and he lives in the heart of every Indian. That is why Indian people have celebrated him.”
For Vibhakar, a Congress politician, the sequence — from the Ministry’s breakup with the occasion to Mr. Modi skipping it — suggests the Modi government was firm on replacing the legacy of India’s founding fathers with Hindu nationalist ideologues.
Aishwar Rao, spokesperson of the Urban Development Ministry, told The Hindu that three months after the regime at the Centre changed, his Ministry received a Cabinet Order stating that except Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary, the Ministry should not fund memorials of any historic leader.
Mr. Modi did tweet a picture, though, depicting the prime minister standing before Mr. Shastri’s statue, his head down, his hands pressed together. Though the picture was backed with a text that read — “I bow to the proud son of India, Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri on his birth anniversary” — it still lacked details of when and where it was taken.
