NEW DELHI: The Centre on Tuesday reconstituted the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library society by removing all the Congress leaders as its members.
In the absence of Mallikarjun Kharge, Jairam Ramesh and Karan Singh, associated with Congress and its ideology, the society will now don a rather saffron look with PM Modi as its president and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh as vice president.
Besides the PM, Home Minister Amit Shah, Nirmala Sitharaman, Prakash Javadekar are also part of the society, which has been given a term of five years.
The Centre also inducted two well-known personalities – senior journalist and founder of India TV Rajat Sharma and lyricist and chairperson of Central Board of Film Certification Prasoon Joshi.
PM Modi biographer inducted
Another notable presence, according to the order, will be PM Modi’s biographer Kishore Makwana, a writer from Gujarat.
Makwana had authored the book Modi: Common Man’s PM in 2015.
Nehru biographer dropped
It’s not just Congress leaders, but former Union Minister M.J. Akbar too has been dropped from the reconstituted NMML society.
Akbar had retained his post of Vice Chairmanship of the Executive Council, last year who had resigned from the Union Cabinet on October 17 in the wake of multiple sexual harassment allegations.
He is believed to be the chief executor of revamping the Nehru Museum in the Teen Murti Estate.
He has been the biographer of Jawaharlal Nehru and hence reportedly proposed a design plan for the Nehru Museum.
Akbar has authored a book titled Nehru: The Making of India.
Arnab out Rajat in
Arnab Goswami, a prominent TV figure who created a row in November last year with his appointment was appointed to this prestigious society has been replaced with senior journalist Rajat Sharma.
What is NMML?
The Nehru Memorial Museum and Library set up in Delhi’s Teen Murti Bhavan in 1966 in memory of the country’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru.
It is an autonomous institution under the Ministry of Culture, that maintain, acquire and preserves Nehru’s personal papers and others related to the freedom movement.
NMML controversy
The NMML has been embroiled in controversy. While the reconstitution bid was animatedly opposed to by Congress members, the government didn’t move from its stand to “democratize” it. Earlier, PM Modi wanted to establish a Prime Minister’s Museum showcasing all Prime Ministers of India which was vehemently opposed by the members of the grand old party.
Earlier, an eviction notice was sent by the Directorate of Estates of the Union Ministry of Urban Development to the Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund, creating a massive row.