Holy Qur‘aan, Bible removed from Indian president’s memorial

CHENNAI, India: Indian authorities have removed a copy of the Bible and the Qur’aan from a new statue of a former president after a complaint by a Hindu nationalist party, officials said on Tuesday.

The removal of the books has fuelled a religious row over a carving depicting a Hindu holy book placed next to the statue of A.P.J. Abdul Kalam at Rameswaram in the southern state of Tamil Nadu.

Kalam, who as a scientist played a leading role in India’s landmark 1998 nuclear weapons tests, was president from 2002-2007 and a strongly secular figure. The sculpted Hindu "Bhagvad Gita" book was placed next to the statue before it was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week on the second anniversary of Kalam’s death.

Relatives placed the Bible and the Qur’aan next to the Gita in protest. That infuriated the Hindu Makka Katchi nationalist party, which said it made the complaint to police. "The authorities removed the Bible and the Qur’aan at the site. We are also looking at the complaint filed with us," police superintendent Om Prakash Meena told AFP.

K. Prabhakaran, a member of the Hindu Makkal Katchi, told The Indian Express newspaper "I respect all these books. But keeping them at the memorial without permission is wrong. Steps should be taken to see such things are not done again."