Home Minister Amit Shah on February 9 rubbished claims of Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, leader of Congress in the Lok Sabha, who alleged in a parliamentary address that the former sat on Rabindranath Tagore's chair in Shantiniketan. Shah also spoke about Choudhury's statement on BJP's national president Jagat Prakash Nadda erroneously claiming that Shantiniketan is Tagore's birthplace.
BOOM had then fact-checked the claim and found it to be false. JP Nadda said Tagore was born in West Bengal. The confusion arose after BJP4Bengal misquoted his remark in a now deleted tweet. Read here.
Amit Shah disrespected Tagore by sitting on his chair: Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury
In a Lok Sabha address on February 8, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury stated that Shah sat on Tagore's chair and disrespected the poet and revolutionary.
In his address, starting from 21.20, Chowdhury can be heard saying in Hindi, "This govt is all of ours. I want to say is, BJP party's leader Amit Shah and Nadda sahab went to Bengal ahead of the elections. They are going to Rabindranath Tagore's Shantiniketan. They are saying that here he was born. This is strange. First read and go, that where he was born. You are suddenly saying that he was born in Shantiniketan. People are laughing. We are feeling bad. That you are leaders of such a big party. Our Amit Shah goes and sits on Rabindranath Tagore's chair. Don't know what people tell you and you go sit. This is a disrespect. You should go but pay attention to the local culture and ethos of the place. Go there several times."
Claims about Amit Shah sitting on Tagore's chair were also viral on Facebook after his visit in December, 2020, based on the below image, where Shah can be seen sitting and signing a vistor's book.
Did Amit Shah sit on Tagore's chair in Shantiniketan?
BOOM was able to ascertain that Shah sat on a window sill and not Tagore's chair during his visit to Shantiniketan on December 20. During his address in the Lok Sabha on February 9, Shah clarified that he did not sit on Tagore's chair but on a window sill nearby. He produced a letter by Visva Bharati's vice chancellor Bidyut Chakrabarty (a copy of which is also with BOOM) who corroborated the same.
According to the letter undersigned by Chakrabarty, in the past several other dignitaries, including former chancellor of the varsity Jawaharlal Nehru, former presidents of India Pratibha Patil, Pranab Mukherjee and prime minister of Bangladesh Sheikh Hasina, have sat on the makeshift seat, which is the "edge of a window".
Additionally, BOOM reached out to Ashok Mahato, registrar, Visva Bharati, who stated, "Tagore's chairs in the campus are mostly covered with white cloth and nobody is allowed to sit on them. The covers are occasionally removed from them but they were kept intact, when Amit Shah visited the campus. In the photo that was viral, Shah can be seen signing a visitors' book sitting on a window sill."
Shah can be seen paying tribute to a similar chair where Tagore used to sit, covered with a white cloth.
Did JP Nadda say Tagore was born in Visva Bharati?
On December 9, the All India Trinamool Congress' official Twitter handle shared a screenshot of a tweet from BJP4Bengal's verified handle, which quoted JP Nadda as saying that Tagore's birthplace is Visva-Bharati. Based on the text in the screenshot, which stated "West Bengal is known for exchanging its ideas and Visva-Bharati is Rabindranath Tagore's birthplace", the TMC further took a dig at Nadda for a factually incorrect statement and accused the party of bringing in outsiders (bohiragawto) for campaigning in the state, who are unaware of its culture and heritage.
BOOM had then fact checked the same and found he said Tagore was born in West Bengal.