As the row over the snooping on Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose's family takes new turns, the kin of freedom fighter Bhagat Singh claimed on Sunday that their family too had been kept under state surveillance for years.
"Our family had been under surveillance for years. Our phone conversations too had been under the scanner for years," Abhay Singh Sandhu, the 57-year-old nephew of Bhagat Singh, told reporters in Mohali.
Sandhu alleged that the snooping on the family’s home had started during British rule and continued even after independence in 1947.
He demanded the declassification of government files relating to Bhagat Singh and his uncle, Sardar Ajit Singh, who too was a freedom fighter.
"We want to know everything which the then British government wrote about Sardar Ajit Singh and Shaheed Bhagat Singh. All records should be declassified. Why should the government hide (records). We are hoping that the present Central government will take a step in this regard soon," Sandhu said.
"My father, late Sardar Kulbir Singh, tried to obtain files or records pertaining to the two which have been kept in the National Archives in Delhi," Sandhu said. The family was told that the files were "secret" and not transferable for 20 to 30 years, he claimed.
"My father, late Sardar Kulbir Singh, tried to obtain files or records pertaining to the two which have been kept in the National Archives in Delhi," Sandhu said. The family was told that the files were "secret" and not transferable for 20 to 30 years, he claimed.
Sandhu is the son of Bhagat Singh's younger brother Sardar Kulbir Singh, who was born in 1914 and was a Jan Sangh MLA from Ferozepur.
Bhagat Singh, along with Batukeshwar Dutt, threw two bombs inside the Central Legislative Assembly of Parliament and was hanged on March 23, 1931 after being convicted for the murder of John P. Saunders, a police officer.
(With PTI inputs)