Politics has again raised its head on the war memorial in the provisional State capital. The construction work of a war memorial at Cheer Bagh has started recently but now the BJP leader and Mussoorie MlA, Ganesh Joshi has demanded that a war memorial should be built by the State Government.
Joshi while speaking on the occasion of Kargil victory day at Gandhi Park on Wednesday requested the Chief Minister, Trivendra Singh Rawat, to allot a piece of land for War Memorial in Dehradun. He even pledged to donate a sum of Rs 50 lakh from his MlA fund for the memorial.
“If the State Government allots land than budget for the war memorial would not be a constraint. I would provide a sum of Rs 50 lakh and similarly other MlAs would also be requested to provide funds,” he said.
The fact that the veteran BJP leader and former soldier of Indian army Joshi raised the issue of a new war memorial when one at Cheer Bagh is already under construction clearly hints that he is not amused by the credit given to fellow BJP leader and former Rajya Sabha MP Tarun Vijay for getting the necessary clearances for War Memorial at Cheer Bagh.
To underlie his image of an ex serviceman and true representative of strong community of armed forces veterans, Joshi also demanded the State Government should install a statue of Baba Jaswant Singh Rawat in the Garhi Cant area and raise the pension of war widows.
When contacted, BJP leader Tarun Vijay refused to say anything on the issue. Vijay incidentally was instrumental in getting clearance from Ministry of Defence for land of war memorial. He also provided the necessary budget of Rs 2 crore from his Member of Parliament local Area Development (MPlAD) fund for the project.
The war memorial was an issue of scoring political points between Congress and BJP earlier but now it seems leaders within BJP are also trying to secure personal political points on the matter.