Restore Jallianwala Bagh’s old look, panel writes to PM Modi : The Tribune India

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Restore Jallianwala Bagh’s old look, panel writes to PM Modi

Tourists at the renovated entrance to the Jallianwala Bagh. - File photo

Aparna Banerji

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, September 8

The Desh Bhagat Yaadgar Committee, Jalandhar, has written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is also the chairman of the Jalliwanala Bagh National Memorial Trust, expressing resentment and anger over the recent ‘beautification’ of the Jallianwala Bagh. The committee has requested the PM to form a panel of prominent historians to “right the historical wrong” and sought the restoration of the Bagh.

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Members of the committee had recently visited the memorial on September 4 after which they raised objections over the recent changes made at the Bagh.

Desh Bhagat Yaadgar Committee

Not a festive place

The murals displayed on the walls of its entrance remind one of a festival and not of a place where more than thousands of Indians were massacred by the British government.

In its memorandum, signed by committee president Ajmer Singh and general secretary Gurmeet Singh, sent to the PMO, the committee sought restoration of the Jallianwala Bagh to its earlier form and layout.

The committee members said: “We have also asked the government not to impose any entrance fee for visiting the memorial, as they have constructed booking counters at the memorial.”

They said the changes had divested the memorial of its historical heritage and had transformed it into a picnic spot. “The murals displayed on the walls of its entrance remind one of a festival and not of a place where more than thousands of Indians were massacred by the British government. Similarly, the well in which hundreds of people jumped to escape the British, has now been concealed in a glass wall through which almost nothing is visible,” they said. The letter adds, “In the same manner, the rendition of history in the videos has its own deliberate omissions and inaccuracies. The use of the term ‘nationalism’ and avoidance of the terms ‘freedom struggle’ or ‘anti-colonial movement’ is also methodologically problematic.”