"The opposition indulged in 'Nehru bhajan' since morning instead of ISRO bhajan."
Hitting out at the opposition for "indulging in Nehru bhajan" instead of "ISRO bhajan", BJP MP Tejasvi Surya said the reality is that most of the scientific institutions were started by people in pre-independence period and former prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru had no role in it.
Participating in a discussion on the success of Chandrayaan-3 mission, he said Arcot Ramasamy Mudaliar and Shanti Swaroop Bhatnagar established the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research in 1942.
"What role did Nehru play - in one of the meetings, Pandit Nehru said 'the members of the governing body will appreciate that it is difficult for me to devote much time to many aspects of the work of the Council.... For the present, Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee will, however, look after the day-to-day routine work of the Council'," Mr Surya said.
He said it was Syama Prasad Mookerjee, the founder of Jana Sangh, under whom the country's earliest scientific establishments were strengthened.
"The opposition indulged in 'Nehru bhajan' since morning instead of ISRO bhajan. An impression is being given that every scientific achievement is credited to Nehru but the reality is far from that...most of the scientific institutions were started by people in pre-independence period when Nehru had no role in it," he said.
Mr Surya said it was former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee who approved Chandrayaan-1 in 2003 but the Congress-led UPA government named the Moon Impact Probe of the Chandrayaan-1 as Jawahar point even though Nehru had no role in the Chandrayaan mission.
"When Chandrayaan-3 landed, Modi ji named the point as tiranga point and did not do bhajan (sing paeans) of any particular person," he said.
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