Panjab University (PU) shooting range will be named as Captain Vikram Batra, PVC, Shooting Range, on July 7, the day when Batra sacrificed his life for the country in the 1999 Kargil War.
Punjab finance minister Manpreet Badal will be in PU, when the syndicate will ratify the recommendations of vice-chancellor Prof Arun Kumar Grover.
Badal, on his visit to PU with Batra’s twin brother on June 25, suggested a suitable building in PU be named after Batra. Badal visited Dewan Anand Kumar Hall, newly-constructed girls’ hostel number 10, shooting range and other buildings. “It is my judgement that the PU shooting range is a suitable place to be named as Captain Vikram Batra, PVC, Shooting Range. July 7 is the day on which he had sacrificed his life. Let it be done on July 7, 2018. Badal will come to PU on this day,” said the communication written by Grover, which will be put before the syndicate for ratification on July 7.
It was in November last year that G L Batra, father of Capt Vikram Batra, the posthumous recipient of Param Vir Chakra, wrote a letter to PU requesting to name any hostel, building, block or auditorium after Batra. The Kargil War hero was a student of DAV College, Chandigarh, and had also stayed in hostel number 1 on PU campus. Vikram had joined a Master’s course in the department of English in 1995-96 session.
