Rahul to rally in Dehradun on December 16 to honour war veterans, Gen Rawat

Top Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will address a rally in poll-bound Uttarakhand on December 16 to celebrate Bangladesh War veterans as well as pay homage to India's first Chief of Defence Staff Gen Bipin Rawat, who died in a chopper crash earlier this week.

The Vijay Samman Rally scheduled for next Thursday at Dehradun will have in attendance a large number of 1971 war veterans and other military veterans. Sources said the rally will also pay homage to Gen Rawat, who hails from Pauri in Uttarakhand.

This is part of Congress’ plans to hold programmes across India on December 16 to celebrate the victory over Pakistan in the 1971 war. It was on December 16, 1971 that Pakistan signed the Instrument of Surrender, leading to the creation of Bangladesh.

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The rally in Uttarakhand comes a day after Congress president Sonia Gandhi is scheduled to attend a function in New Delhi that concludes the year-long celebration of 50th Anniversary of the Bangladesh Liberation War.

Uttarakhand is home to a sizable section of veterans as well as serving military personnel and Congress is attempting to woo them ahead of the Assembly polls early next year.

Congress General Secretary (Organisation) K C Venugopal said programmes like honouring war veterans and war widows and commemorating the Bangladesh Liberation War-1971 should be conducted in a befitting manner at the district level across the country.

He said the Congress’ programmes on the 1971 War celebrations, which were delayed due to Covid-19, started in mid-July with a district-level meeting in Haryana’s Panchkula on July 10.

District and block levels in some of the "soldier states" like Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan could be continued beyond 2021, he said.

Maximum district meetings have been held in Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Tamil Nadu. Congress has so far organised over 100 such meetings throughout the country.

State-level functions started on November 16 with a meeting in Nagaland capital Kohima followed by other states. Venugopal also directed the states, which have not concluded their state-level functions, to organise such meetings up to December 31.

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