NEW DELHI, Feb 13:
A Bill which seeks to amend the Jallianwala Bagh National Memorial Act, 1951 and make the trust which runs the memorial, ”apolitical” was passed in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday.
Piloting the Jallianwala Bagh National Memorial (Amendment) Bill, 2018, Culture Minister Mahesh Sharma said, ”Our main concern is that the trustee of the memorial trust should not be from any political party.”
He also announced that Rs 24 crore have been allocated for improvement of the Jallianwala Bagh memorial.
The Bill which seeks to “delete” the President of the political party as a Trustee, was introduced in the Lok Sabha on December 28 last year.
Earlier, moving the Bill for consideration, the Minister said the 100 years of Jallianwala Bagh massacre will be observed on April 13, 2019.
The Minister said at present, in the composition of the trust, certain inconsistencies have been noticed.
He said the term of nominated Trustees is five years and there was no provision in the Act to terminate a nominated Trustee before the expiry of his term.
In view of the absence of designated Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha and a Trustee being a party specific, it was felt necessary to amend the said Act to make it ”apolitical” and also to provide for termination of nominated Trustees before the expiry of their term.
The Jallianwala Bagh National Memorial (Amen-dment) Bill, 2018, provides to delete ”the President of the Indian National Congress” as a Trustee, to make ” the Leader of Opposition recognised as such in the House of the People or where there is no such Leader of Opposition, then, the Leader of the single largest Opposition Party in that House” a Trustee, in place of ”the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha” and to confer power upon the Central Government to terminate the term of a nominated trustee before the expiry of the period of his term without assigning any reason.
Congress member Shashi Tharoor, AITC member Sugata Bose, BJD member Bhartruhari Mahtab, Food Processing Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal , Shiv Sena member Arvind Ganpat Sawant, CPI (M) member MB Rajesh and SAD member Prem Singh Chandumajra also took part in the discussion on the Bill.
The Bill was passed after the Minister’s reply. (UNI)
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