Tipu controversy: Historians, academicians in Mysuru divided on the issue

Mysuru, Oct 31: Historians and academicians in Mysuru are divided on the government’s move to drop lessons on Tipu Sultan, popularly called the Tiger of Mysuru, from school textbooks, with some saying the lessons should stand, while others saying the government is justified in removing them.

Historian Nanjaraja Urs says the very idea of scrapping lessons on Tipu from textbooks is “dangerous” and sets a “bad precedent”. “We need to look at history from the eyes of history,” Urs said. “We cannot take decisions on incidents that happened in the 17th and 18th centuries. Tipu Sultan wasn’t a freedom fighter. He was a ruler and like any ruler of that period, he wanted to eject the British out of the country. We must keep this in mind.”

Urs said Tipu had ushered in several useful reforms and the fact that he came to power by killing others does not hold water.

“Tipu refused to cancel the ban on alcohol despite being advised by his coterie to use the revenue from selling liquor to save his children who were mortgaged to the British,” Urs said. “All rulers came to power by killing others. Let us not use this argument to oppose Tipu. It is false to portray him as anti-Hindu. He saved Sringeri temple from attacks mounted by the Marata Brahmin rulers. We need to look at all these incidents from the eyes of history.”

Writer Aravind Malagatti also called the government’s move “dangerous”. “Decisions on these issues must be left to academicians and not politicians. Political interference in textbook content is a dangerous trend,” Malagatti said. However, right wing activists and leaders justified the government’s decision. BJP MP Pratap Simha, a vocal critic of Tipu, insisted that the erstwhile ruler destroyed several kings including the Nayaks of Chithradurga, Yadu rulers of Mysuru. He said Tipu was anti-Hindu. “There is no need to pass on information of two cruel kings to the next generation,” Simha said.

Vadiraj, a social activist with Samarasya, a RSS backed organization, said the issue has blown up because of the “wrong portrayal of Tipu in textbooks by leftist historians”.