Goa Board has no record of Savarkar's clemency letter to British: CM

Panaji: The Goa Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education has no record of whether Vinayak Damodar Savarkar had written to the British pleading clemency when he was jailed in Port Blair, Chief Minister Pramod Sawant told the state Assembly on Monday.

"The Goa Board does not have any records of the same," Sawant said in a written reply to Congress MLA Aleixo Reginaldo, who sought to know whether it was a fact that Vinayak Damodar Savarkar had written to the British asking for clemency or to set him free when he was jailed in Port Blair.

To another question by Reginaldo, who asked if former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru's photo had been "removed from class 10 history books" published by the Board, Sawant, in his written reply, said that no such thing had been done and that Nehru's photo continues to feature in the Board's history books.

To another question from the Congress MLA, who wanted to know whether details of the contribution of 'Veer' Savarkar to the freedom struggle of Goa find a reference in the same history book, Sawant said: "The existing text book 'History & Political Science' of Class 10, introduced by the Goa Board makes no mention of contribution of Vinayak Damodar Sawarkar to Goa's struggle for freedom."