A portrait of Mohammed Ali Jinnah at the student union’s hall inside the Aligarh Muslim University campus has stirred up a controversy with Bharatiya Janata Party MP from Aligarh Satish Gautam writing to the varsity’s Vice Chancellor Tariq Mansoor demanding an explanation. In his letter, the BJP leader asked him of the compulsion behind installing a photo of the man who had played a key role in the partition of India in 1947.
Guatam said he doesn’t know where the picture is displayed in the university but questioned why it is there altogether. He said, after India’s Partition, there is no justification for display of the picture of Pakistan’s creator. Satish suggested to the VC that if they indeed wished to display a portrait, they should install photos of great persons like Mahendra Pratap Singh who had donated the land for setting up the university. The BJP MP had earlier filed an RTI application seeking information about the portrait of Jinnah which was ignored by the AMU administration.
Reacting to the BJP MP’s letter, AMU student’s Union president Mashkoor Ahmad Usmani said that the portrait of Jinnah was installed in 1938. He said that Jinnah was honoured with a life time membership of the student union before 1947.
“He was the hero of undivided India”. Jinnah had been given lifetime membership of the AMUSU in 1938 , much before the partition of India and that is why his picture has been displayed and will always remain there’’, said . Usmani, adding `` next day the BJP leader might question the display of BR Ambedkar picture as they are now targeting the SCs’’.
He said, instead of writing to the VC, Gautam should have written to the students union as the picture is placed in AMU Students’ Union Hall. “We would have given a befitting reply to him,” he said, adding that this too exhibited the divisive mindset of the BJP leaders.
Former AMUSU president Faizal Hassan argued on the same lines, saying that the portrait was installed much before the partition but added that if the government passes any order regarding removal of the picture, the administration will surely take it into consideration.
Member in charge of AMU’s Public Relation Shafey Kidwai said that students union is an independent body and they had started giving life memberships from 1920 and its recipients include Mahatma Gandhi also. “Jinnah too was given the same membership,” he said, adding that his pictures had been put there.
Tasleem Ahmed Rehmani, president of Muslim Political Council of India defended Jinnah’s portrait at the varsity asserting that the AMU is an autonomous body under an act of parliament. “It is the sole discretion of the university administration as to whose portrait should be displayed and what should be taught to students. The university should take an appropriate decision regarding this,” he said.
BJP MP Satish Gautam, alleging Jinnah doesn’t belong to any part of India. “We have removed all British viceroys’ photos from Rashtrapati Bhavan, removed statues… names of roads like Aurangzeb have been renamed and Jinnah own daughter had said that she can’t accept an idiotic concept of Pakistan,” .
He added that arguments that AMU is self-governed and has own set of principles are fine but “they are taking money from the consolidated fund of Central government and they have to live within the national ethos. “Yes it has an internal curriculum… but when it comes to national interest, better comply with it,” he said.
Meanwhile the Aligarh Muslim University Students Union will bestow lifetime membership of the body to former Vice President of India Hamid Ansari on May 2, who had served as Vice Chancellor of AMU. He will be the second alumni after Zakir Husain, who was the President of India to get life membership of the body.