NEW DELHI: Holding that bravehearts like the 17th-century Ahom warrior Lachit Borphukan “showed that forces of fanaticism and terror perish but the immortal light of Indian life remains eternal,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said here on Friday that the warrior’s life “teaches us that instead of nepotism and dynasty, the country should be supreme.”
Speaking at the concluding day of a three-day programme celebrating the 400th birth anniversary of Borphukan, Modi said India’s history taught after Independence remained the same as a conspiracy during the period of slavery. Borphukan is credited with defeating the army of Mughal emperor Aurangzeb in the battle of Saraighat.
Modi, who released a book, ‘Lachit Borphukan: Assam’s hero who halted the Mughals’, said while there was a need to “change the agenda of foreigners who made us slaves,” this was “not done”. He added that Borphukan’s “life teaches us that instead of nepotism and dynasty, the country should be supreme”.
The Prime Minister said that “even though the Mughals had captured Guwahati, it was bravehearts like Lachit Borphukan who won independence from the clutches of tyrannical rulers of the Mughal empire.”
Conflating the celebrations surrounding Borphukan’s 400th anniversary with the government’s Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav programme, Modi reiterated “India’s mood to get rid of the mentality of slavery and take pride in its heritage.”
Pointing out that “stories of fierce resistance to tyranny in every part of the country were willfully suppressed”, the PM said that while there are “countless stories of victory over tyranny during the long period of repression, the mistake of not recording those events in the mainstream is being rectified now”.