Manmohan Singh Death: Govt to allocate space for ex-PM’s memorial, says Home Ministry

The Union government will allocate space for a memorial of former prime minister Manmohan Singh, Home Ministry said on Friday night. This has been communicated to his family and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, the ministry said.

The ministry said the government received a request to allocate space for a memorial for Singh from the Congress chief. Immediately after the Cabinet meeting, Union Home Minister Amit Shah communicated to Kharge and the family of Manmohan Singh that the government would allocate space for the memorial, the ministry said in a late-night release titled “Facts of the matter regarding memorial for former Prime Minister Late Dr Manmohan Singh“,

In the meanwhile, the ministry said, cremation and other formalities can happen because a Trust has to be formed and space has to be allocated to it.

Manmohan Singh, who headed the Congress-led UPA government and is credited with economic reforms, passed away on Thursday at the age of 92.

He was India’s prime minister for 10 years between 2004 and 2014.

The Congress on Friday said that not finding a location for the cremation and memorial of Singh was a deliberate insult to the country’s first Sikh prime minister.

The party raised the issue after the home ministry said Singh’s last rites would be held at New Delhi’s Nigambodh Ghat at 11.45 am on Saturday with full state honours.

The government will allocate space for a memorial for Singh from the Congress chief.

Singh, who breathed his last at AIIMS, New Delhi, is credited with opening the Indian economy to global competition and is often regarded as the architect of India’seconomic liberalisationas Finance Minister in 1991. Singh went on to become Prime Minister of the Congress-led UPA government.

Singh had not been keeping well for quite some time. His only public appearance in 2024 was at the book launch of his daughter at theIndia International Centre(IIC), New Delhi, in January 2024.