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Last survivor of Jallianawala
Bagh tragedy dead
WSN Network
AMRITSAR: Shingara
Singh, the brave Sikh who was known as the last known survivor of
the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of April 13, 1919, died after a brief
illness at Sultanwind village this week and possibly as a sad man.
India
failed to grant him the status of a freedom fighter.
Bapu Shingara
Singh, who witnessed the merciless shooting of unarmed Punjabi
protesters, including women and children, at Jallianwala Bagh by
British forces led by Brigadier Reginald Dyer, wanted only
recognition as a freedom fighter and not even a penny from the
government. The cremation at the village was attended by MLA
Inderbir Singh Bularia and Deputy Commissioner Kahan Singh Pannu.
Bapu was in his early 20s at the time of the tragedy.
During a visit to
Amritsar in 2003, then President Dr A.P.J.Abdul Kalam had made it a
point to meet Shingara Singh. He too had asked the authorities to
accord the status of freedom fighter on Shingara Singh, and make
arrangements to record his “eyewitness account” in a book form.
Ironically, a
fact-finding committee of
Guru Nanak Dev
University, headed by historian Harish Sharma, had claimed that
Shingara Singh was not present at Jallianwala Bagh during the
massacre, his family members said he indeed was but could not
narrate the entire sequence of events due to his old age.
1
July 2009
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