NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday unfurled the Tricolour at the Red Fort to mark the 75th anniversary of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose's declaration of the Azad Hind government - India's first independent government.
Modi also inaugurated the renovated national police memorial and a new police museum for the policemen. He also unveiled a plaque to mark the occasion. The plaque would be kept at barrack number 3 of the Red Fort, the place where the Azad Hind Fauj faced trial.
At the Red Fort, the prime minister, wearing the Azad Hind Fauj cap, took on the Congress for neglecting the contributions of Netaji saying that several good sons of the country like him, Ambedkar and Patel were forgotten in the favour of one familyFurther attacking the Gandhi-Nehru family without naming them, the prime minister said that Indian policies were based on the British system post-Independence as things were seen through British glasses.
"Today I can definitively say that in the later decades of independent India if the country had got the guidance of personalities like Subhas Babu, Sardar Patel, the conditions would vary greatly," he said. Modi also announced an annual national award in Netaji's name for police personnel for excellent work in rescue and relief operations during times of disaster.
"From this year onwards, we will give an award in the name of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose to police personnel who do exemplary work while rescuing and providing relief to people during the time of any disaster," the prime minister said adding that the award would be presented on Netaji's birth anniversary, January 23, every year.
Dedicating the police memorial to all the cops who sacrificed their lives for the nation since Independence, the prime minister lashed out at previous UPA governments for their failure to build the memorial. "Why did it take 70 years after Independence to make the memorial a reality?" he questioned.
October 21 is observed as the Police Commemoration Day every year in memory of the policemen killed at Hot Springs in Ladakh by Chinese troops in 1959. The prime minister said that the idea of making such a memorial had come up during Atal Bihari Vajpayee's tenure as prime minister and the foundation stone for the museum was laid by then home minister LK Advani in 2002.
"I know that the construction was affected due to legal problems but had the earlier government wanted or tried it by heart, the memorial would have been completed several years ago," Modi said.