A century-old publishing house that is alleged to have remained silent on Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination will be awarded the Gandhi Peace Prize for 2021.
The Union culture ministry said in a media release on Sunday that the jury headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi had selected Gorakhpur-based Gita Press for the award “in recognition of its outstanding contribution towards social, economic and political transformation through non-violent and other Gandhian methods.”
Mahatma Gandhi had been close to the founders of the Press as well as Hanuman Prasad Poddar — the founder-editor of its magazine Kalyan — but they developed differences on untouchability of Dalits.
Poddar and Gita Press founder Jaydayal Goyandka were among the 25,000-odd people arrested in the wake of Gandhi’s assassination in 1948.
Poddar was, however, honoured with a postage stamp by the P.V. Narasimha Rao government in 1992.
Since it was instituted in 1995, the prize, which carries a cash award of Rs 1 crore, has been given 19 times. The winner, if any, for the prize of 2022 has not been announced.
In his book, Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India, Akshaya Mukul writes: “In 1926, when Poddar went with Jamnalal Bajaj to Gandhi to seek his blessings for Kalyan, he was given two pieces of advice by the Mahatma: do not accept advertisements and never carry book reviews… Poddar accepted this advice and even today Kalyan and Kalyana Kalpataru do not carry advertisements or book reviews.”
He adds: “The relationship between Gita Press and the Mahatma grew tempestuous after a series of deep disagreements on caste and communal issues, such as temple entry for Harijans and the Poona Pact…. Gandhi’s best efforts to change Poddar’s views on untouchability failed. Poddar’s diatribe against Gandhi continued in the pages of Kalyan till 1948.”
After Goyandka and Poddar’s arrests in 1948, “(Industrialist and patron) G.D. Birla refused to help the two, and even protested when Sir Badridas Goenka took up their case. For Birla, the two were not propagating sanatan dharma but shaitan (evil) dharma…. Gita Press maintained a studied silence on the Mahatma’s assassination. The man whose blessing and writings were once so important for Kalyan did not find a single mention in its pages until April 1948 when Poddar wrote about his various encounters with Gandhi.”
The book says in its epilogue: “Not only has it played a pivotal role in ‘popular efforts to proclaim Hindu solidarity (sangathan), pious self-identity and normative cultural values’, as a player in the theatre of Hindu nationalism it has also stood side by side with the majoritarian narrative of the RSS, Hindu Mahasabha, Jana Sangh and BJP at every critical juncture since 1923. And in times of intense communal division, Kalyan has exchanged the sobriety of a religious journal for the language of hate and religious identity.”
The culture ministry added in its statement on Sunday: “Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi recalled the contribution of Gita Press, in promoting the Gandhian ideals of peace and social harmony. He observed that the conferment of Gandhi Peace Prize on Gita Press, on completion of hundred years of its establishment, is a recognition of the work done by the institution in community service.”
The RSS-linked Vivekananda Kendra and Ekal Abhiyan Trust had won the prizes for 2015 and 2017, respectively. Previous winners included freedom fighters and anti-apartheid activists Julius Nyerere (1995), Nelson Mandela (2000), Desmond Tutu (2005), and Mujibur Rahman (2020).