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Now, ‘Godse’ says he was a patriot

Actor Sharad Ponkshe, who plays Gandhi’s assassin Mee Nathuram Godse Boltoy, says the play is a big draw

An event was also organised by an NGO called the ‘Maharana Pratap Battalion’ in Panvel on November 15 to mark Godse’s death anniversary. (Source: Express Photo) An event was also organised by an NGO called the ‘Maharana Pratap Battalion’ in Panvel on November 15 to mark Godse’s death anniversary. (Source: Express Photo)

Even as Unnao MP Sakshi Maharaj backpedalled after calling Nathuram Godse a patriot, theatre-goers in Mumbai are reportedly showing a renewed interest in a play on the assassin of Mahatma Gandhi.

Revived this October 2 after 700 shows in 11 years until March 2013, Mee Nathuram Godse Boltoy has seen “great response, especially among the youth”, according to Sharad Ponkshe, who plays the lead role in the widely acclaimed but controversial play. “We have had 60 years of Gandhi. Now people want to hear the other side. Why make a God of a person?” Ponkshe asks, talking to The Indian Express after Friday’s show in a suburban auditorium in Mumbai. “If you make a person God, his mistakes are also just as great,” he says.

“What’s wrong if someone called Godse a patriot. Before killing Gandhi, Godse worked as a freedom fighter and towards Akhand Bharat. You cannot dismiss his work prior to the killing. Killing the Mahatma was wrong. But he has paid the price for it over 50 years ago. So if someone calls him a patriot, why is his viewpoint so wrong?” says Ponkshe.

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Ponkshe’s sentiments are shared by the audience too, including the first-timers as well as those who have returned to see the play.

Amit Nimbalkar (28), an IT engineer, wanted to watch the play for a long time and finally made it on Friday. “Gandhi’s values and principles became bigger for him than the needs of the nation. Not even Congressmen followed his non-violence path after his death,” he says. While killing someone is wrong and Godse paid for it, he continues, Gandhi’s view on Partition despite anticipating widespread violence was also wrong. “Godse was a patriot. There should be no problem in saying that, I believe so,” he says.

Festive offer

Meanwhile, amid a fresh spotlight on memorial functions held in Mumbai to mark the day of Godse’s execution on November 15, office-bearers of the Hindu Mahasabha and other groups said these were an annual affair in Mumbai and its suburbs.

In addition to the functions held by the Hindu Mahasabha to mark November 15 as “Shaurya Divas” or Day of Valour, an event was also organised by a non-governmental organisation called the “Maharana Pratap Battalion” in Panvel, the event that Congress MP Hussain Dalwai referred to in Parliament earlier this week.

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Nitin Dhavale, a BJP office-bearer in Dombivali, meanwhile, said he had initiated similar programmes last year, although there was no involvement of his party in it.

Dhavale, a former Bajrang Dal convenor in Dombivali and the suburb’s president for the BJP’s Yuva Morcha for the last six months, says his objective is to spread the word that while Godse was hanged for killing the Mahatma, his vision of  an undivided India must be seen and understood as that of a patriot. “All patriots fight against injustice and Nathuramji was opposing injustice to Hindus and Indians in general, to stop further partitions of India. Apart from the massacre of thousands during Partition, Gandhi was also responsible for the accumulated anger of Hindus for having deliberately taken the side of Muslims since the 1920s,” says Dhavale, a private tutor by profession.

Dhavale says neither he nor any of the 40-50 people who attended this year’s November 15 function in Dombivali consider murder acceptable. “But the common ground we have with Nathuramji is that we are firm believers in Akhand Bharat.”

Last year, Dhavale’s function was attended by actor Sharad Ponkshe.

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All India Hindu Mahasabha spokesperson Dinesh Bhogale says the memorial functions for Godse do not glorify Gandhi’s assassination and Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis’s announcement that no glorification of Godse would be allowed in the state are irrelevant. “The BJP and Hindutva are far, far removed. The BJP government will neither stop implementation of the Sachar committee report nor will it stop aiding madarsas. Whatever the Congress was doing, the BJP will continue to do,” he says.

Incidentally, when the Hindu Mahasabha initiated its memorial services for Godse in the mid-1990s, the then BJP-Shiv Sena government had come down strongly on its efforts. “Gopinath Munde wanted to apply TADA against us,” Bhogale says. This year’s function too saw local police applying penal sections against congregation of people to stop the event. But the Mahasabha still managed to hold functions in Delhi, Lucknow and Ajmer, apart from Mumbai, Bhogale adds.

Back at the auditorium, as Ponkshe delivers his dialogues on why he took the final step, the audience responds with an audible “yes”. Many in the 350-strong crowd sniffle at his last moments and not many were dismissive of Sakshi Maharaj calling Godse a patriot.

First uploaded on: 14-12-2014 at 03:30 IST
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