BJP plans Ambedkar memorials across country and in London

After apportioning crores for Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel’s statue in Gujarat, the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Centre is now planning to inject crores to develop Ambedkar memorials across the country, including a ‘pilgrim’ centre at Babasaheb’s birthplace in Mhow.

After apportioning crores for Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel’s statue in Gujarat, the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Centre is now planning to inject crores to develop Ambedkar memorials across the country, including a ‘pilgrim’ centre at Babasaheb’s birthplace in Mhow.

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"As a tribute to our constitution maker, our government will develop Ambedkar memorials in different parts of the country and one in London," Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan said on Tuesday.

The Lok Janashakti Party president was in Mhow, the birth place of Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, to commemorate his 124th birth anniversary on Tuesday.

"The party (BJP) will develop an international centre in remembrance of Dr BR Ambedkar at 15 Janpad Road in New Delhi with an expenditure of Rs 152 crore; a memorial (will be built) at Deeksha Bhoomi in Nagpur with an investment of Rs 100 crore; a 13 acre land in Chicholi village near Nagpur will be developed, where Dr Ambedkar left his typewriter, pens and other articles," the BJP ally said.

"Our government will develop 26, Alipur Road (where Dr Ambedkar National Memorial is situated) in New Delhi on the lines of Mahatma Gandhi's Raj Ghat," the union minister of consumer affairs, food and public distribution said.

"We will acquire private lands in the surroundings if required to do so," he added.

In addition to this, the BJP-led government in Maharashtra will acquire land from the textile department in Dadar to develop Chaitya Bhoomi for pilgrims and erect a statue of Dr Ambedkar with an expenditure of Rs 35 crore in London, where Dr Ambedkar once lived.

Addressing a mass gathering of more than two lakh people, mostly dalits, in Mhow, Paswan said, the government will enact a strong legislation for safeguarding the rights of the SCs and STs.

He said the BJP-led government was fighting for the rights of Dalits and trying to ensure reservation for them in private companies too.

Criticising the Congress, the LJP chief said, "Congress has never spoken for the rights of the Dalits, it is the BJP-led governments at the centre which has always stood for their rights."