Centre's inertia on national war memorial annoys armed forces

NEW DELHI: The armed forces are increasingly getting upset at the Modi government's failure to even kick off the process for constructing the long-pending National War Memorial (NWM) despite allocating Rs 100 crore for it in the Union Budget last July .

The defence ministry (MoD) has neither finalized the Cabinet note for the NWM, nor launched the socalled “global search“ for the architect to design it till now.“The Rs 100 crore allocation will lapse at the end of this fiscal (March 31) without even the preliminary steps being taken,“ said a source.

It will take at least five years for the entire complex -the NWM, its adjoining museum and underground parking -to come up near India Gate at a cost of around Rs 500 crore.“It will take over a year to just select the architect in the proposed competition, and another two years after the contract is inked to build just the memorial,“ the source said.

Asked about the delay , MoD officials said “exploratory consultations“ were still in progress on the NWM's basic design and construction since the PM wanted a “world class“ structure. “Moreover, there is the question of what all the museum should house.Various options are being examined,“ said an official. But the glacial pace is galling for the armed forces, given that the NWM was first mooted way back in 1960. “India is probably the only country that does not have a dedicated NWM. In August last year, the three service chiefs had again briefed then defence minister Arun Jaitley on the matter.But nothing much has happened,“ said a senior officer.

The huge delay in the NWM is a highly emotive issue for the armed forces. “It's extremely sad that successive governments have not built the NWM to honour the soldiers who laid down their lives to guard an independent India.“