PYC demands renaming Mohali airport after Bhagat Singh

28 September marks the birth anniversary of the legendary revolutionary, Shaheed Bhagat Singh, who was sentenced to death in the Lahore conspiracy case on 23, March, 1931.

Lashing out at previous UPA led government at the Centre, he alleged that farmers’ land was acquired at “throwaway” prices in order to hand it over to big corporates for setting up SEZs.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on September 11 inaugurated the new civil air terminal building at Chandigarh Airport, which will handle both domestic as well as global flights. “The need of the hour is to do something tangible to commemorate the memory of Bhagat Singh and not just give him symbolic homages”.

“But when it was inaugurated, the Shaheed’s name was ignored”.

My friend Pritam Singh, professor of economics at Oxford Brookes University, says that even though there have been innumerable attempts from across the political spectrum – from the extreme left wing Naxalite fringe to rightwing ultranationalists like the Khalistanis – to appropriate Bhagat Singh’s political legacy, nearly every political group has had to contend with contradictions in claiming the martyr. Moreover, neighbouring Haryana did not raise any objection over his name.

“I want to clarify that there was no demand from the family that the airport be named after Sardar Bhagat Singh”, Sandhu said.

– Early in 1980, when a former freedom fighter Dr. Kali Charan came to inform Bhagat Singh’s mother, Mata Vidyavati, of the Punjab Government’s intention to install statues of Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev at three separate crossings in Ludhiana City, she turned quiet.

While the saffron brigade of Modi leaves no stone unturned while letting the minority know their place vis-a-vis the majority, Bhagat Singh’s views on communalism and communal leaders were very bitter. “However, people now feel it as an insult to the great martyr who made supreme sacrifice for the sake of this country”.

Mr Sandhu also reiterated that the files pertaining to Bhagat Singh and Sardar Ajit Singh, a freedom fighter, be declassified.