The educational institutes belonging to the Charotar Vidya Mandal in Anand district, which is Sardar Patel's birth place, remained closed on Friday to express solidarity against Jaswant Singh's remarks on Sardar Patel and Jawaharlal Nehru in his book. Both the ABVP and the NSUI also joined ranks in Karamsad town, where Sardar Patel was born, to close down colleges on Friday.

CVM Chairman C L Patel said, "We have not given orders for closures, but all the 80 educational institutes' heads individually took this decision. This is because the head of the departments did not support Jaswant Singh's thoughts about Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Patel. It was to show solidarity that they closed for one day." Some of the institutes in Vallabh Vidyanagar were also closed.

Twinkle Bhatia, ABVP leader said, "We asked the colleges to close down to show our anger against the remarks made by Singh in his book."

Express news service