The Union government has decided to put an end to the recent dispute over Lutyens Delhi’s sprawling residences, ordering on Saturday that no official bungalow will now be made available for conversion into a memorial.
“Henceforth, no bungalow will be made available for a memorial for any person,” Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said.
In the most raucous case recently, RLD chief Ajit Singh refused to vacate his official residence and instead demanded converting it into a memorial for his late father and former prime minister Charan Singh. Ajit Singh’s resistance at 12, Tughlak Road was allotted to him by the previous government as he was then a union minister.
A few months ago, a similar controversy had erupted over the conversion of the then Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar’s official residence into a memorial for her father and former deputy PM Jagjivan Ram. In the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections, the Cabinet had decided to allow the memorial for 25 years. This decision was against NDA government’s of 2000, which had banned such a practice.
The Cabinet also decided on Saturday that the Central government will associate with the birth and death anniversaries of Mahatma Gandhi only and not the anniversaries of other departed leaders.
“Gandhiji’s birth and death anniversaries, which are managed by the Rajghat Committee, will be a function organised by the central government…For all our other national leaders, it will be private societies or trusts of their supporters, parties, family members which will organise these functions,” Jaitley said after the Cabinet meeting.
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