With Minority Affairs Minister Najma Heptulla stoking a controversy by reportedly calling all Indians "Hindus", CPI(M) today accused the RSS-BJP of "distorting" history to serve their ideological and political ends.
"RSS-BJP and their government are completely distorting history and historical record... This is being done to serve the Sangh's ideological and political project of converting our secular, democratic republic into their version of a rabidly intolerant, fascistic Hindu Rashtra," senior CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury told PTI here.
His comments came after Heptulla stoked a row by reportedly saying all Indians were "Hindus", although the minister later clarified that she had called all Indians 'Hindi', which she said was the Arabic term for people living in India.
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Yechury said, "The fact is that earlier travellers from beyond the Hindukush mountains had named our land as (belonging to) those beyond the Indus river.
"Since in the Arabic alphabet, the letter 'H' is often used for 'S', Sindhustan was called Hindustan and the people living here down the millennia referred to as Hindustanis.
