On March 23, 1931, three young freedom fighters were hanged in Lahore jail, becoming immortal heroes for generations of Indians.
In Jamshedpur, over 10,000 people, including 8,000 on motorcycles, paid their tribute to the charismatic troika of revolutionaries Bhagat Singh, Shivaram Rajguru and Sukhdev Thapar on their 86th anniversary of martyrdom.
Organised by Naman, a social outfit founded by former state BJP spokesperson Amarpreet Singh Kale, present at the event were BJP Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy, state minister and Jamshedpur West MLA Saryu Roy, some Congress leaders, Intuc leader Rakeshwar Pandey, ex-armymen Colonel Sanjay Singh from Ranchi, Lieutenant-General B.K. Chaturvedi and retired IPS Yashwardhan Jha Azad from Delhi, among others.
Around 12.15pm, Swamy who reached Jamshedpur in the morning, flagged off the bike rally from Transport Ground in Agrico, where four ivory horses fronted 4,000 bikes with a rider and pillion-rider each, two open jeeps and half a dozen cars. Members of Akhil Bharatiya Poorva Sainik Seva Parishad, students from South Point School, Mango, who were dressed as Bhagat Singh and army officials, and a Naman Rath with cut-outs of Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru also participated in the rally.
Reverberating with slogans of Bharat Mata ki Jai and Vande Mataram, the rally covered an 8km route covering Golmuri Main Road, Kalimati Road and Straight Mile Road before coming back to the starting point well over 3.15pm.
Before this, dignitaries felicitated about 45 ex-armymen and kin of Jamshedpur martyrs Kishan Kumar Dubey, BSF jawan (2015), Lieutenant Manoranjan Kumar of the Navy (2014) and Dilip Besra, army jawan (1999, Kargil).
Remembering Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru, Swamy said: "I salute the martyrs whose contribution will always be remembered by us. They fought for freedom but we have to fight poverty, violence against women and corruption."
Participants, who had to wait for over an hour for the rally to start, said they didn't mind at all.
"It's an honour to participate in a rally to pay tribute to my heroes who contributed to free India," said Sharan Pal Singh, who took part in the rally with his friend Devendra Singh.
