Senior BJP leader and the lone minister from Kerala in the Narendra Modi Cabinet KJ Alphons has stoked a fresh controversy with his remark that “Malayalees have a DNA problem of backstabbing”. According to a report in news agency ANI, Tourism minister Alphons said that Malayalees need to change this attitude.
Alphons said this while referring to former Kerala DGP TP Senkumar’s criticism of the Centre’s decision to honour ISRO scientist Nambi Narayanan with the Padma Bhushan. In his remark, Senkumar had said that Narayanan contributed little to ISRO.
“Malayalees have a characteristic of seeing things in a poor light, whenever another Malayalee achieves something. Malayalees have a DNA problem of backstabbing,” IANS quoted him as saying while interacting with reporters in Kochi on Sunday.
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“This attitude has to change, but do not know why this habit is so common among Malayalees. Malayalees should be happy that a fellow Malayalee has been recognised, but no Malayalee likes to see another Malayalee achieve anything,” he added.
Narayanan, arrested in the ISRO spy case in 1994, was granted relief by the Supreme Court in September last year. The court had held that he had been framed. Narayanan was among those who received Padma Bhushan award this Republic Day.
Narayanan was born on December 12, 1941, in Nagercoil of Kanyakumari district in Tamil Nadu. He was a scientist and aerospace engineer. As a senior official at the ISRO, he was in-charge of the cryogenics division. It was in 1994, Narayanan was falsely charged with espionage and arrested.
