AMRITSAR (TIP): The Damdami Taksal, a Sikh seminary, announced on April 25 that the Operation Bluestar memorial – – built in memory of Sikh militants killed in the 1984 army operation inside the Golden Temple — was ready and would be opened for public on April 27. Chief of Damdami Taksal Harnam Singh Khalsa said on Thursday that the Taksal would hand over the memorial to the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee on Saturday.

The memorial has been built by the Taksal. The SGPC began the Akhand Path (continuous recitation of Guru Granth Sahib), which would conclude with a bhog on Saturday when the memorial will be inaugurated. The memorial is inside the Golden Temple complex and looks like a gurdwara with round-the-clock ‘Parkash’ (installation) of Sri Guru Granth Sahib. According to Khalsa, no photographs would be allowed inside the memorial. Golden Temple head Granthi said, “The memorial has been built in memory of martyrs like Jarnail Singh Bhinderanwala, Amrik Singh and all those who had died while fighting the army during Operation Bluestar in 1984.” The Operation Blustar was carried out by the Army to flush out armed militants from Golden Temple. Bhinderanwala was the 14th head of the Damdami Taksal and had led the militants against the army in the Golden Temple in 1984.

Various Panthic organizations had been demanding the construction of a memorial following the operation and on February 20, 2002 the executive committee of the SGPC passed a resolution for the construction of memorial. On June 6, 2003 the Akal Takht, the supreme temporal seat of Sikhism, declared Bhinderanwala a ‘martyr’ and on June 6, 2011, the SGPC entrusted the karsewa of memorial to the Damdami Taksal which began the work on May 20, 2012.