PM Modi to inaugurate Birsa park on tribal icon’s birth anniversary

RANCHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate Ranchi’s Birsa Munda Memorial Jail Park on November 15 virtually from New Delhi. The inauguration will officially mark the first Janjatiya Gaurav Diwas, which was announced by the Union cabinet on Wednesday.
The Union government aims to celebrate the valour of tribal revolutionaries through the Janjatiya Gaurav Diwas. Jharkhand celebrates its statehood day on November 15, which is the birth anniversary of tribal revolutionary Birsa Munda.
The park has been built in and around the 200-year-old Ranchi Central Jail. It was in this jail that Birsa Munda, who is regarded as one of India’s tallest revolutionaries, died in British captivity on June 9, 1900.
Envisioned in 2013, the park has been built under the patronage of the Union ministry of tribal affairs at a cost of Rs 26 crore by the state urban development development’s subsidiary Jharkhand Urban Infrastructure Development Company (JUIDCO). Once inaugurated, the 15-acre facility will be operated under public private partnership (PPP) under the watch of Ranchi Municipal Corporation (RMC). “A committee has been set up for drafting the operational policies. The draft will be then put up before the cabinet for its approval,” a JUIDCO official said.
“Besides PM Modi, who will remain virtually present, Governor Ramesh Bais, chief minister Hemant Soren and Union tribal affairs minister Arjun Munda will attend the event in-person in Ranchi. State tribal affairs minister Champai Soren, Ranchi MP Sanjay Seth, Ranchi MLA CP Singh and Ranchi mayor Asha Lakra will also attend the event,” a senior official in the urban development department said on anonymity.
Though state urban development secretary Vinay Kumar Choubey could not be contacted, Munda’s office confirmed the inauguration.
The present day park was chosen by Soren during his first stint as CM in 2013 for restoration of the old jail. Later, when BJP was voted to power in 2014 the construction for setting up a museum began during the tenure of erstwhile CM Raghubar Das. It was held up on multiple occasions. Three separate agencies were roped in for restoring the old jail building, setting up the museum and landscaping of the complex. The restoration of the jail building, which will house the museum, was completed in 2019.
Besides Birsa, the museum will house statues of 10 tribal revolutionaries from Jharkhand. There will be light and sound shows and visitors will be shown brief documentaries of the tribal heroes.