Kolkata: The Bhartiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM), the youth wing of the Bharatiya Janata Party, organised a rally here to protest the removal of a statue of iconic martyr Mangal Pandey.
BJYM President Amit Thakkar said the removal of statue when the country is celebrating the 150th anniversary of the landmark 1857 uprising is an insult to freedom fighters.
"When the entire nation is celebrating 150 years of the nation’s first war of independence, the West Bengal Government has removed the statue of Mangal Pandey. It is not only an insult to Mangal Pandey, but an insult to all freedom fighters," claimed Thakkar.
Pandey’s statue was removed on May 7 from a park named after him, which is located opposite Writers’ Buildings – the West Bengal secretariat.
Statues of freedom fighters Benoy, Badal, Dinesh were also removed from the B.B.D. Bagh area of Dalhousie locality for construction of an automated parking facility.
The Public Works Department (PWD) plans to reinstall the statues later at the same spot or shift them to a memorial elsewhere.
Mangal Pandey, a Hindu soldier with the 34th Native Infantry, is believed to have fired the first shot on March 29, 1857. He was hanged on April 4, 1857.
Source : ANI
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