Nobody, including the hard core Hindu groups, ever treated former President of India and “missile man” Dr A P J Abdul Kalam as a person belonging to Muslim community.
As a matter of fact, Kalam was a true Indian. Though he was a devout Muslim with staunch faith in Quran and Islamic practices, he was well-versed in Hindu traditions.
Born in Rameshwaram, Kalam learnt Sanskrit, read Bhagawad Gita and was a strict vegetarian. He used to play Carnatic devotional music on veena.
He used to treat Hindu seer Pramukh Swami of Swami Narayan sect as his ultimate spiritual guru.
So, attributing religious feelings to such a noble man who was given Bharat Ratna by the BJP government in 1997 was really unpardonable.
But, Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who does not lose any opportunity to make political gains from even a smallest incident, did not hesitate to project Kalam as just a Muslim, rather than a universal personality.
On Tuesday, Naidu addressed a public meeting of Muslims at Guntur as part of his efforts to woo the community after he parted ways with the BJP-led NDA.
He made a lot of promises for Muslims, including four per cent reservations, a cabinet berth for them, allocation of Rs 40 crore for Noor Basha Federation and setting up of Autonagars exclusively for Muslims where they could set up workshops.
So far so good. But what irritated people was the way Naidu sought to project Kalam as a Muslim representatives, while making tall claims about his encouragement of Muslims.
He recalled how he had influenced the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in making Abdul Kalam as President of India. Pointing out a reference made about him in the book Wings of Fire written by Dr Kalam, the TDP president said when Kalam was working as a professor in Annamalai University, he had received a call from the Prime Minister’s Office on an evening.
“Even before he attended the Prime Minister’s call, I telephoned to him and told him that the Prime Minister would make an offer to him for contesting the Presidential elections. I requested him to accept the offer. I prevailed upon the Prime Minister to nominate Dr Kalam to the President’s post. That was the commitment I had towards Muslims,” Naidu claimed.
The chief minister also claimed that he had given due importance to Muslim leaders from Guntur, including Rajya Sabha ticket to late Lal Jan Basha and made his brother Ziauddin chairman of Minorities’ Commission.
“Hidayat from Guntur was appointed as AP Muslims Finance Corporation chairman,” he said.
It clearly showed Naidu had equated Dr Kalam with all these Muslim leaders of the TDP, to appease Muslims.
