Rare 1914 revolver donated to BSF's arms museum in Indore

The family of a businessman from Jharkhand has donated a revolver made in Britain in 1914 to the arms museum of the Border Security Force's Central School of Weapons and Tactics (CSWT) in Indore, officials said on Wednesday.

The `Webley .455 Mark 5' revolver, belonging to late Sitaram Rungta, would cost several crores in the international market of antique weapons.

But his son Nandlal Rungta, a businessman from Chaibasa in Jharkhand, has donated it as the family wants to make Sitaram Rungta's memory ever-lasting, they said.

The businessman donated his father's weapon on the basis of permission from the West Singhbhum district's arms magistrate, the officials said.

After all the legal formalities were completed, a representative of Rungta handed over the revolver to the BSF museum in the presence of CSWT's officiating Inspector General Rajan Sud, they said.

According to officials, Nandlal Rungta was inspired by an article published in a Kolkata newspaper two years ago on CSWT's arms museum and decided to donate his family revolver.

All India BSF Ex-Servicemen Welfare Association president Ajay Kumar Jain helped the businessman in donating the revolver to the BSF museum.

"The price of this revolver is being estimated in crores of rupees in the international market of antique weapons, but Rungta decided to donate this weapon to the BSF museum to make the memory of his father ever-lasting," Jain said.

The rare revolver will be safe in the BSF museum and will make the coming generations aware of the history of weapons, he said.

Nearly 300 rare weapons have been preserved in the museum, established in 1967 at the behest of BSF's first Director General KF Rustamji, as per officials. These include guns, pistols, revolvers, rifles, sub-machine guns, light machine guns, medium machine guns, rocket launchers, mortar and grenade launchers, they said.

The museum specially displays weapons from the 14th century to those of the later generations, the officials said.