New Delhi: After a retired Pakistani naval commodore stated that Bhagat Singh, being a revolutionary atheist, opposed Islamic ideology, Lahore’s city district government has reportedly shelved a plan to rename after him a major square in the city – the site where the revolutionary was hanged by the British.
Bhagat Singh, alongside Shivaram Rajguru, killed 21-year-old British police officer John Saunders in Lahore in December 1929, mistakenly thinking he was the officer responsible for Lala Lajpat Rai’s death. Singh was subsequently convicted and hanged in March 1931, when he was 23.
The Pakistani newspaper Dawn reported first on Sunday (November 10) that the ‘awareness brief’ by the former military official was filed along with documents submitted by the Metropolitan Corporation of Lahore to the Lahore high court last week.
“Denied, after receiving of application of petition, in the meanwhile, a reference was moved by Commodore Tariq Majeed (Retd.), briefed that, this is a forged/concocted case and the Shadman Chowk must not be named Bhagat Singh Chowk,” said a report submitted to the high court signed by the metropolitan corporation’s chief public relations officer.
A single bench of the high court postponed the hearing of the contempt plea to January 17, 2025 due to the unavailability of the petitioner’s counsel, as per Dawn.
The saga began in December 2012 when the metropolitan corporation decided to rename various roads, squares and underpasses across the city, proposing that the Fawara Chowk Shadman be renamed ‘Bhagat Singh Chowk’.
Following a newspaper announcement, objections were raised to the proposed renaming, leading an NGO named the Bhagat Singh Memorial Foundation to file a writ petition in the Lahore high court, advocating that the square be renamed in honour of Singh.
According to a research paper about the campaign to rename the square after Singh, objections were raised by local traders as well as the head of the Jamaat-Ud-Dawa.
In September 2018, the high court closed the case, directing Lahore’s mayor to make a final decision on the renaming application “in accordance with law”.
In March this year, the high court requested responses from the provincial and district governments regarding a petition by Bhagat Singh Memorial Foundation chairman Imtiaz Rashid Qureshi, who had initiated contempt proceedings over the failure to make a decision on renaming the Shadman Chowk after Singh.
The metropolitan corporation’s document to the court, dated November 8, said that an “awareness brief” was moved by the retired defence officer, which is dated September 18, 2018. The retired officer described himself as “an analyst of national and global issues and … dedicated to exposing the issues harmful to Pakistan’s ideology, security and sovereignty”.
According to the four-page brief of retired Commodore Majeed, Singh had “no role in the subcontinent’s freedom struggle”.
“He was not a revolutionary but a criminal a terrorist in today’s terms – as he killed a British police officer and for this crime he and his two accomplices were hanged,” he argued.
Further stating that Singh was an atheist by his own declaration, the retired Pakistani military officer said, “Calling this criminal a “shaheed” is an extremely offensive and a deliberate insult to the concept of shaheed in Islam”.
He claimed that “propaganda” was appearing in Pakistani newspapers supporting Singh. “I wondered why this character, an atheist, who was alien to Pakistan and an enemy of Pakistan’s Islamic ideology was being favoured with publicity, but I ignored it”.
He specifically referred to a news item that covered an event organised by Pakistani cultural activists and students on the eve of Singh’s death anniversary, which had also advocated for renaming the square.
The Pakistani defence analyst in his ‘awareness brief’ also asked for banning the Bhagat Singh Memorial Foundation for “working against the Islamic Ideology as well as the Culture of Pakistan”.
“The NGO’s chairman, Imtiaz Rashid Qureshi, and his legal counsel, Abdul Rashid Quresh, appear to be Muslim. But don’t they know that in Pakistan it will be unacceptable name any place after Bhagat Singh, an anti-Islam atheist, and who look inspiration from Guru Gobind Singh and Shivaji who were relentless enemies of Muslim people? And, don’t they know that Islam forbids statues of human beings?”.
Incidentally, while the ‘brief’ dates to September 2018, the provincial Punjab government had apparently taken steps to conserve Singh’s house even in 2019, as per the Express Tribune. A news report also stated that a seminar to commemorate the struggle and sacrifice of Singh and his comrades was held at the Pakistani Punjab’s Institute of Language, Art, and Culture in Lahore.
In March 2019, the office of Lahore’s deputy commissioner referred to the place as “Bhagat Singh Chowk (Shadman Chowk), Lahore” in an official order about security arrangements, which was greeted by activists as a “victory”.
