Mamata Banerjee accuses BJP-led govt of distorting history

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday took a potshot at the BJP-led Central government alleging that it was trying to distort Indian history.

Speaking at the 78 session of the Indian History Congress which began on Thursday, she said, "It is strange that some people believe Mahatma Gandhi was not a patriot. But think of Nathuram Godse, who had assassinated Gandhi, a better nationalist instead. It is incredible," she said. She added that politicians should refrain from writing history as distortions were inevitable because of the different ideologies of different political parties. "Truth should be reflected in history. Even if I make a mistake it should be revealed in history," she said.

She also alleged that these attempts of 'rewriting history' were calculated moves taken out of political vendetta. "What is the use of our scholars and historians then? If we don't see the real past through them, how do we calculate the future?" she said.

Recently members of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alleged that Indians have been taught distorted history because the text books which they learn from had been written by historians with a Left alignment, who had comprised most of the intelligentsia of independent India.

Opposition had termed the move by BJP and RSS as an attempt to tamper with history to suit their tastes and fuel their idea of Hindutva.

Interestingly, on Thursday, Marxist historian Irfan Habib had said that history depended on facts and attempts to 'invent facts' would be termed as fiction.