Ramesh gives Maniben Patel’s diary pages to Rajnath, rebuts Nehru–Babri claim
Meeting Singh outside Parliament’s Makar Dwar, Ramesh gave him photocopies of the Gujarati text along with a Hindi translation
Congress leader Jairam Ramesh on Thursday handed defence minister Rajnath Singh what he described as the original Gujarati diary entries of Vallabhbhai Patel’s daughter, Maniben Patel, challenging the minister’s recent remarks on Jawaharlal Nehru and the Babri Masjid.
Meeting Singh outside Parliament’s Makar Dwar, Ramesh gave him photocopies of the Gujarati text along with a Hindi translation, insisting that the entries contain no reference to Nehru proposing public funds for the construction of the mosque.
Congress leader Supriya Srinate posted a clip on X, and said that a visibly annoyed Singh replied that he could not read Gujarati and noted that the BJP already possessed an English version.
The exchange follows a political row triggered by Singh’s speech in Vadodara last week, in which he claimed Nehru had suggested state expenditure for building the Babri Masjid but was stopped by Sardar Patel.
The Congress has accused the Defence Minister of “peddling falsehoods” and demanded an apology.
Ramesh has maintained that the diary entries, as published in the 2025 Gujarati volume Samarpit Padchhayo Sardarno by C.A. R.S. Patel, do not substantiate Singh’s statement. Posting images of the pages on X, he said there was a “vast gap between the original text and what Rajnath Singh and his fellow ‘distorians’ are propagating”.
The BJP has stood firm behind Singh. Its national spokesperson and Rajya Sabha MP Sudhanshu Trivedi cited another publication, Inside Story of Sardar Patel, Diary of Maniben Patel, asserting that it records Nehru raising the Babri Masjid matter and Patel refusing government funds for mosque construction.
The Congress has rejected these claims as “fabricated”, accusing the BJP of relying on “WhatsApp University” versions of history to attack Nehru and distort archival material.