The right-wing group Hindu Sena commemorated Queen Victoria on the 118th anniversary of her death, saying the queen had won India its first independence.
India's founding fathers, from Mahatma Gandhi to Jawaharlal Nehru, are known the world over for fighting British colonialism and winning freedom for India.
But not every Indian thinks like that. Ever since the rise of Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Nehru bashing has become all too common, and even Gandhi's killer, Nathuram Godse, is being hailed as a hero.
On Tuesday, a Hindu nationalist group called Hindu Sena, which is affiliated to the BJP, staged a demonstration in Delhi to commemorate Queen Victoria on the 118th anniversary of her death.
Hindu Sena also declared that Queen Victoria was the first soldier to free India from the 'tyranny' of the Mughal Sultanate.
“Britishers contributed for our first independence from foreign terrorists, tyrants, and ended hundreds of years of Islamic rule, that was our first independence in true sense," said 33-year-old Hindu Sena founder Vishnu Gupta.
The leader said British colonial rule controlled Mughal-era princely states by combining them into one entity, arguing: "How we can call the rule of Britishers as slavery?”
The outfit was recently in the news for celebrating US President Donald Trump’s birthday.
A huge portrait of the queen was carried in the parade and then set up at the entrance of the Indian parliament. The activists praised British colonialism by chanting slogans such as: “Long live Queen Victoria.”
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