The Hindu : Kerala News : Panikkar refutes Narayanan's charges

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Feb 09, 2005

Kerala

Kerala

Panikkar refutes Narayanan's charges

By Our Special Correspondent

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, FEB. 8. The noted historian, K. N. Panikkar, has accused the former Indian Council for Historical Research (ICHR) chairman, M.G.S. Narayanan, of ``indulging in prevarication'' on the findings of the One-Man Review Committee that went into ICHR's controversial withdrawal of two volumes prepared as part of the `Towards Freedom' Project during the NDA rule.

In a statement, Prof. Panikkar said that Prof. Narayanan had referred to my ``foul play'' and ``pranks'' relating to the preparation and publication of a volume of the ``Towards Freedom'' Project which I was invited to edit. Prof. Narayanan alleged that ``Prof. Panikkar's volume had gone to press in a hurry — earlier language was `smuggled to the publisher'— when there was a change in the Ministry.''

``My volume was handed over to the Chairman of the Council in 1995 and its receipt is recorded in the minutes of the Council. On the basis of an examination of the records of the Council, the Review Committee has stated that the manuscript has remained with the Council for three-and-a- half years for processing before it was sent to the Publisher. That is quite a hurry, I must say, and indeed remarkable political foresight on my part!''

Secondly, Prof. Narayanan claimed that ``Prof. Panikkar had sent incomplete manuscript to the Publisher. There are several portions, including some documents, missing from the manuscript currently in the possession of the ICHR, which was procured from the Oxford University Press by the ICHR during the tenure of Prof. Narayanan as the Chairman. Given that the Committee of inquiry has found that a `plan was hatched to scuttle the Project outside the ICHR' the disappearance of a part of the manuscript may have greater importance than what meets the eye.''

``One would have expected Prof. Narayanan to provide some explanation for the grave charges levelled against him by the Review Committee,'' he said and alleged that Prof. Narayanan was prevaricating on the issue.

Prof. Panikkar said: ``The conclusions of the Review Committee, based on a close reading of the records of the Council, are disconcerting. They reflect on the low level to which the morality of our public functionaries had nose-dived during the ascendancy of communalism.''

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