Bhagat Singh’s pistol back, finally

Jupinderjit Singh

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 21

Shaheed Bhagat Singh’s pistol, with which he shot dead British police officer JP Saunders in 1928, is back in the state after a gap of 47 years and six months.

It would soon be displayed at the martyrs’ memorial in Hussainiwala (Ferozepur district).

The Central School of Weapons and Tactics (CSWT) of the Border Security Force, Indore, where is was kept all these years, transferred it to the BSF headquarters in Jalandhar following demands of its return by the government, media and a public interest litigation (PIL).

The pistol, a .32 colt of US make, was last seen in Punjab at the Police Academy, Phillaur on October 7, 1969. It was transferred to the CSWT, Indore in a lot of eight pistols for display by an order of the President. The CSWT needed old weapons for explaining the development in weapons technology to the BSF recruits.

Following a series of news reports in these columns leading to its discovery in the CSWT Indore, the state and the police department had sought the return the pistol to Punjab.

A local lawyer HC Arora had moved a PIL for the return of the pistol.

The Punjab Cultural Affairs Department had sought its transfer for display at the martyr’s ancestral village Khatkar Kalan in Nawanshahr.

Finance Minister Manpreet Badal and the Director General of Police had also followed up the demand of return of the weapon with the Union Home Ministry and the BSF national headquarters at New Delhi.

The BSF officials said though the pistol has been transferred, the force will continue to be its owner of the historic pistol till the Punjab and Haryana High Court decides the PIL.

A BSF spokesperson said IG Pankaj, who is Director of the CSWT, sent the pistol by hand in the custody of a team of BSF jawans. The weapon was received and was fit for display. We are discussing the modalities of the display. It would be displayed honourably at Hussainiwala next week in all probability,” he added.