Scientist Bhargava to return Padma Bhushan to protest 'attack on rationalism'
Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) founder-director Pushpa Mittra Bhargava on Thursday said he is returning his Padma Bhushan award alleging that the National Democratic Alliance government was trying to make India into a “Hindu religious autocracy” even as more scientists joined the chorus of protest against “growing intolerance”.
His decision came hours after 107 senior scientists signed an online statement on Wednesday to join the chorus of protests by other scientists, artists and writers.
He said he will return the award conferred on him in 1986 because he felt the climate in the country was of “very strong fear” and it was “against rationality, against reason and against scientific temper”.
“I have decided to return the award. The reason is that the present government is moving away from the path of democracy, moving towards the path of making the country Hindu religious autocracy just like Pakistan. This is not acceptable... something I find unacceptable,” the 87-year-old scientist said.
On Tuesday, 135 scientists from across the country had signed an online petition addressed to President Pranab Mukherjee against "the systematic spread of intolerance and communal hatred in the country". Bhargava was among the second set of 107 scientists who followed suit on Wednesday, saying rejection of reason has led to the lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq in Dadri, and the assassinations of scholar M M Kalburgi, rationalist Narendra Dabhoklar and communist Govind Pansare.
“It is the same climate of intolerance, and rejection of reason that has led to the lynching in Dadri of Mohammad Ikhlaq Saifi and the assassinations of Professor Kalburgi, Dr Narendra Dabholkar and Shri Govind Pansare,” said the scientists and academicians including Bhargava and other Padma Bhushan recipients Ashoke Sen and P Balram.
On Tuesday, a group of scientists had petitioned President Pranab Mukherjee voicing concern over incidents of intolerance, including the killing of Kannada writer MM Kalburgi, and urged him to initiate “suitable actions”.
The scientists have joined the writers and filmmakers in the protest, which has been termed as a “manufactured rebellion” by the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA government.
“There is a climate of very strong fear now and it frustrated me. This is a personal decision of my family and myself nobody else involved in this decision,” Bhargava said.
He also alleged that the Centre was not keeping its promises. “The Modi government should do what it has promised. He is not keeping his promises. Development, peace working in a democratic way.... At the moment it seems the RSS is running the government and not Mr Modi.”
Stating that he had protested on many other occasions in many different ways Bharghava said “the space for dissent was now decreasing” and that “the climate of the country had now reached a status where something drastic needs to be done.”
“The present government does not understand how science is done. In this respect, they are much worse in comparison to all the earlier governments in our country. No understanding of what science is about and how it is done. If you ask an institute to earn its own money, it can’t do any research,” he said.
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