Tributes paid to Jallianwala Bagh martyrs on 103rd anniversary

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, April 13

Tributes were paid to martyrs of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre on 103rd anniversary today. A contingent of the Punjab Police paid tributes by reversing arms and observing two-minute silence. Leaders from different political parties remembered the martyrs and hailed their courage.

Meanwhile, members of the Jallinawala Bagh Freedom Fighters Foundation expressed their resentment for not being invited to the event.

Sunil Kapoor, chief, Jallinawala Bagh Freedom Fighters Foundation, said they held a separate programme in which a granthi offered ‘Ardas’ and a priest performed a pooja for eternal peace of martyrs at the memorial.

He said demands, including setting up a place for divinity where holy books of all religions should be kept, “Punjab Rattan Award” to all the martyrs, raising a wall inside the historic Bagh where names and stories of the martyrs must be displayed, facilities to the descendents of martyrs, status equivalent to martyrs of freedom movement and restoration of historic narrow alley from where Brigadier General Reginald Dyer had crossed remained unmet so far.

After paying tributes, BJP Rajya Sabha MP Dushyant Kumar Gautam, said, “Innocent and unarmed people got martyred here. It’s an opportunity to spread the message that freedom was not achieved with without sacrifices.”

Shwait Malik, trustee of the National Memorial Trust (Jallianwala Bagh), which is headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, said it was the prerogative of the Amritsar Deputy Commissioner to extend status of martyrs to those who were killed on April 13, 1919. “I request him to do it at the earliest.”

A painting and drawing contest was also held for the students on the occasion.

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