Roads, institutions to be named after poets, academics, slain cops

NEW DELHI: An award-winning Dogri litterateur, a policeman lynched by a mob, and a former Doordarshan director gunned down by militants will have roads, schools and governmentowned institutions named after them in the Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir, people familiar with the matter said.

A senior government functionary said a long list of names has been drawn up for this, which will be the state’s tribute to academic and literary stalwarts and also to those who laid down their lives in the line of duty.

The proposed list includes poet Padma Sachdev who passed away in August; deputy superintendent of Jammu and Kashmir Police Mohammed Ayub Pandith, who was lynched by a mob outside a mosque in Kashmir in 2017; and Lassa Kaul, who, as Doordarshan director in 1990, was gunned down by militants outside his house.

Also on the list are Makbool Sherwani, a National Conference worker who played a key role in holding off Pakistani intruders in 1947 and bought time for the Indian military to arrive; celebrated poet Dina Nath Nadim, who played a stellar role in Kashmir’s progressive movement; noted poet, broadcaster and freedom fighter Sarwanand Koul Premi, who was gunned down along with his son Virendra in 1990; J&K Police inspector Arshad Ahmed Khan who died in a fidayeen attack in Anantnag in 2019; and Brigadier Rajendra Singh who died fighting Pakistani raiders in Kashmir in 1947.

The list was drawn up after consultation with local people in each district of Jammu and Kashmir; also surveyed were members of the panchayat and district development councils, the police and the paramilitary.