The Opposition has launched a scathing attack on the BJP-led central government over PM Narendra Modi’s “cow in our mata” remark.
The opposition parties have, in fact, started quoting “special vicharak” of the RSS and BJP – Veer Savarkar, who “was opposed to cow being called mata (mother)”.
Congress veteran and Rajya Sabha MP Digvijay Singh responded to PM Modi’s remark saying that “Hindutva icon” Veer Savarkar never considered cow as ‘mata’ (mother) and had no problem with consumption of beef.
“Veer Savarkar in his book had written that cow can’t be our mother and there is no problem in eating cow beef,” Digvijay Singh said.
Also read: Hindutvavadis spread hatred, says Rahul Gandhi
He added: “Savarkar had written in his book that a cow is an animal which wallows in its mal (excreta) and hence cannot be considered mata (mother).”
Singh further said that Veer Savarkar in his book had also “clearly stated” that there cannot ne any relation between Hindu and Hindutva.
“Veer Savarkar in his book had also written that the Hindu religion doesn’t have any relation with Hindutva,” the former Madhya Pradesh chief minister said.
Senior RJD leader Shivanand Tiwari also spoke in similar lines as Digvijay Singh.
Also read: Sikkim: Over 275 tourists’ vehicles left stranded at Nathula after heavy snowfall
Tiwari said that Veer Savarkar viewed calling cow as mata (mother) as an insult to human race.
“Veer Savarkar questioned how can an animal be a mother or father of a human being. Calling cow the mother of human beings is an insult to human race,” Tiwari said.
He added: “Savarkar used ‘Hindutva’ term for the first time 1923 and said that Hindu and ‘Hindutva’ are different things.”
Notably, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi recently, recently at a rally, had termed the BJP a party of Hindutvavadis.
Also read: Over 30 including children and women killed, bodies burnt in Myanmar’s Kayah: Report
“The two words – ‘Hindu’ and ‘Hindutvavadi’ – have different meanings. I am Hindu but not Hindutvavadi,” Rahul Gandhi said.
“Mahatma Gandhi was a Hindu, but Nathuram Godse was a Hindutvadi,” Rahul Gandi had said.
SAVAKAR’S VIEWS ON COW AND BEEF:
During his forced stay in Ratnagiri, he came across an article in the Marathi daily Bhaala in which the editor had posed the question “Who is a Hindu?” and answered it himself by declaring that a Hindu was “one who regards the cow as his mother”.
Savarkar felt compelled to react. “If the cow’s a mother to anyone at all, it’s the bullock,” he wrote in a piece for the Marathi journal Kirloskar.
The cow was a highly useful animal but its worship made no sense, he said, arguing that humans could possibly consider as a divine being someone with superhuman qualities but certainly not an “out-and-out animal” inferior to humankind.
It was time to abandon the “naive practice” of “gau-poojan” also because it was nothing short of “buddhi hatya” or “murder of the intellect”.
In short, Savarkar pronounced himself in favour of “cow care, not poojan”.