Taking a dig at Akali leader Harsimrat Kaur Badal obvious ignorance, Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh on Sunday asked her to spend some time and energy on learning history instead of expending all of it in launching Twitter tirades against him.
As Harsimrat, in an evident desperate bid to mislead the people of Punjab in order to woo their votes for the Lok Sabha elections, posted a series of factually incorrect tweets against his grandfather, Capt Amarinder retaliated to accuse her of trying to cover up her failure to explain the infamous lavish dinner hosted by her great grandfather for General Dyer, the butcher of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre.
After Harsimrat posted some random and unconnected pictures and video to question him on his grandfather’s relations with General Dyer, the Chief Minister asked her, once again, to explain her great grandfather’s dinner for General Dyer instead of taking refuge in falsehoods.
“It is obvious that the Union Minister has no answer to his question on why she, her brother Bikram Majithia, husband Sukhbir Badal and his father Prakash Singh Badal had failed to apologise for the shameful act of her great grandfather,” he said.
“You're asking me to learn distorted history @HarsimratBadal_? A random video of a social visit by my grandfather in London, with no connect to #JallianwalaBaghMassacre, wont help you cover your great grandfather's lavish dinner to butcher Gen Dyer on the very day of the massacre.” Capt Amarinder tweeted in response to her Harsimrat’s tirade on Twitter.
“You willfully continue to ignore the ignominious history of your forefathers'. I’d seriously advise you to brush up your history. Read a lot as after these elections people will make you sit at home & you would have a lot of free time. Happy reading!”, he went on to say.
In an earlier tweet, he wrote: “Amazed at how dumb someone can be! Can't you see the difference @HarsimratBadal_ between General Dyer & Michael O'Dwyer, Punjab's LG who had no role in #JallianwalaBaghMassacre & was assassinated by Udham Singh? Are you so desperate that you'll spread any disinformation to win?”
Harsimrat was just trying to grasp at non-existent straws to wriggle out of the situation as she had no defence for her great grandfather’s unpatriotic and anti-nationalist actions, said the Chief Minister in a statement later.
Capt Amarinder lashed out at the Akali leadership for trying to politicise the Jallianwala Bagh centenary, quite patently at the behest of their political masters – the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
He pointed to Harsimrat’s tweet resonating Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s remarks that he (Capt Amarinder) had insulted the martyrs of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre by not attending the central government function.
Notwithstanding the fact that elections in India had, over the years, become a playground for no-holds barred battles, it was shameful that the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), at the bidding of the BJP leadership, was exploiting the Jallianwala Bagh martyrs to woo voters, said the Chief Minister.
