Bihar Congress president hoisted tricolour at Gandhi Maidan on 1st I-Day
2
Patna: Did you know who unfurled the national tricolor at the city's historic
Gandhi Maidan
on August 15, 1947, when India became independent? It was neither the governor nor CM.
According to historians and old-timers, it was Mahamaya Prasad Sinha, then president of Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee (BPCC), who unfurled the national flag at Gandhi Maidan (then called Patna Lawn or Bankipore Maidan) in the presence of a huge gathering.
Patna University ancient Indian history department's former head Jayadeo Mishra pointed out that at the time India attained freedom from the Britsh rule, the chief minister (then called premier) of Bihar, Sri Krishna Sinha, held executive responsibilities, but traditionally, ceremonial duties like flag hoisting on Independence Day were performed by prominent political figures from the party apparatus. Hence, BPCC president got an opportunity to unfurl the national tricolor.
Ironically, Sinha went on to become the CM in March 1967 in the first non-Congress govt in Bihar.
Moreover, Mishra said, the provincial set up was in transition stage post-independence, and the administrative and ceremonial protocols had not yet standardised around the CM performing the flag-hoisting duties as it happens today.
The lawn was named after Mahatma Gandhi after his assassination in 1948 on the suggestion of a schoolteacher from Muzaffarpur.
During freedom movement, Gandhi had addressed several meetings, including Champaran Satyagraha, from this maidan. After India became a republic in 1950, the governor and CM started unfurling the national tricolor at Gandhi Maidan on Republic Day and Independence Day respectively.
However, retired atomic energy scientist S N Vrinave, who was a student of city's B N College at the time of independence, said that newly appointed governor Jairam Das Daulatram, who had taken over the charge from his predecessor Sir Hugh Dow the same day, laid the foundation stone of the Martyrs' Memorial (Shaheed Smaarak) in front of the Secretariat and unfurled the national flag there in the presence of then CM S K Sinha and his deputy Anugrah Narayan Sinha.
This iconic memorial, reminding the people of the supreme sacrifices of seven young men (who lost their lives while attempting to hoist the national flag atop the Secretariat building in 1942) was later installed at the place on Oct 24, 1956, by then President Rajendra Prasad.
The sculptural masterpiece that sits on a tall pedestal was created by noted artist Debi Prasad Roy Choudhury, the then principal of Govt College of Fine Arts, Madras. The statues were cast in Italy. The finely imposing bronze statues of the seven martyrs, with the crease of dhoti-kurta being depicted, immortalised them in the consciousness of the people.
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