Controversy over chowk’s name, control

Rachna Khaira

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, May 16

A controversy has erupted over the maintenance of a chowk named after Ghadarite Banta Singh Sanghwal, who was also known as the ‘Terror of Punjab police’ during the British regime. The MC had recently given its maintenance to the KMV College.

According to Dr Jasveer Kaur Gill, great granddaughter of Ghadarite Banta Singh Sanghwal, the chowk was inaugurated in 1992 by the then Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh. Since then, the family with the support from the Desh Bhagat Yaadgaar Committee and other organisations was maintaining the chowk.

“However, the MC has now given the chowk to KMV College which blatantly rubbed off the name of our great grandfather from all four pillars and has written its own name on the pillars,” alleged Dr Gill. She said when they went to the site in the night, to rewrite the name, the family was manhandled by the security guards of the college.

Later, the family along with its supporters lodged a strong protest at the site today and demanded the maintenance to be taken back from the KMV College. When contacted, Mayor Sunil Jyoti said the MC had taken the step not to disgrace the sacrifice of Sanghwal, but to develop a respectable place for the statue. “The chowk was in a dilapidated condition from the last few years. The grills were broken and all the garbage from nearby areas was being thrown at the spot,” he said.

“We have asked KMV to develop a green belt around the area and also to maintain the statue of Banta Singh Sanghwal. However, the college authorities wanted to write the college’s name at the spot and so we have allowed it to write it on two of the four pillars,” said Jyoti.

Refuting the charges, Dr Jasbir Gill said the society created after Banta Singh’s name was capable enough to look after the maintenance of the chowk and it should be given to them.

Banta Singh Sanghwal

“Known as ‘terror for Punjab Police’ Banta Singh along with six other Ghadarites from Jalandhar kissed the gallows at an age when the youths dream of their marriage and fortune ahead.

According to his granddaughter Dr Jasbir Kaur Gill, on seeing the lackadaisical approach of Indians towards British atrocities, Singh built a strong revolutionary centre in his village, Sanghwal, known as the headquarter of revolution in Doaba region.

He stirred the conscience of villagers by creating a panchayat, a library, a veterinary hospital, an autonomous justice delivery system to augment a parallel administrative set up to reduce the dependence of British structures.