LUCKNOW: A day after the Gita Press was declared the winner of the Gandhi Peace Prize for 2021 by a jury headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Board of Trustees of the publication, on Monday, agreed to accept the honour but not the prize money of Rs 1 crore as it did not accept any donation whatsoever.
"Gita Press never accepts any kind of donation and the Trustee Board of the Press decided late Sunday evening that it will accept the honour but not any monetary award,” said Gita Press manager Lal Mani Tripathi on Monday morning. The jury, headed by PM Modi, decided to confer the prestigious award on Gita Press.
“We thank the Union Ministry of Cultural Affairs, Government of India and PM Modi for choosing the Press for conferring the prestigious award on Gita Press and it is a matter of great honour for us. It is our principle not to accept any kind of donation so the Trustee Board has decided to not to take the award money, however, we will certainly accept the honour by receiving the citation,” Tripathi said, suggesting that the government should spend the cash award amount elsewhere. The award also includes a plaque and an exquisite traditional handicraft/handloom item.
The Gita Press was selected for the coveted prize for its outstanding contribution to social, economic and political transformation of the country through non-violent and other Gandhian methods.
However, the Congress came down heavily on the Centre for conferring the honour on the Gita Press, calling it a "travesty" and "like awarding Savarkar and Godse".
"There is a very fine biography from 2015 of this organisation by Akshaya Mukul in which he unearths the stormy relations it had with the Mahatma and the running battles it carried on with him on his political, religious and social agenda," party leader Jairam Ramesh tweeted.
Meanwhile, in a reaction to the Congress’s opinion on the issue, UP CM Yogi Adityanath launched a veiled attack on the Congress first family, saying that the “accidental Hindus” were not able to digest the honour being conferred on the Gita Press.
CM Yogi said: “Gita Press has been serving Sanatan Dharma for a century. Sanatan Dharma paves way for welfare of humanity and gives the message of ‘Sarve Bhavantu Sukhinah’ (happiness and welfare of all) and ‘Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam’ (The World Is One Family).”
“It is a matter of pride that this publication has received the Gandhi Peace Prize,” he added.
Referring to the Congress stand, Yogi said, “Being so disrespectful towards the country's heritage is utter shamelessness. The Gita Press has been publishing religious literature for the last 100 years. Without the help of the government and at a low cost, it has served as the centre for the publication of all forms of religious literature, such as the Gita, Vedas, the Ramayana, and the Ramcharitmanas.”
The Gandhi Peace Prize was instituted in 1995 to mark the 125th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi and is open to all persons irrespective of nationality. The Gita Press is world's largest publisher of Sanatan religious texts. It was founded in 1923 by Jaya Dayal Goenka and Ghanshyam Das Jalan for promoting Sanatana Dharma principles and ideologies. The press was established on April 29, 1923 on the day of Vaishakh Shukla Trayodashi.
“The press has published over 93 crore books so far and all the publishing operations of the press are conducted from Gorakhpur. We publish 1800 types of books in 15 languages. In the financial year 2022-23, we provided two crore 40 lakh books to our readers and despite its low cost, the monetary value of the books is Rs 111 crore. The demand is very high and despite all efforts we are not able to meet it,” Tripathi added.
Gita Press Trustee Board chairman Keshav Ramji Agarwal resides in Kota, General Secretary Vishnu Prasad Chandgotia in Rishikesh and trustee Devi Dayal looks after the management of the press in Gorakhpur.