A sombre function to pay tribute to the victims of the attack on the Indian Parliament six years ago turned into embarrassment for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other leaders, when a tearful widow of one of the victims accused the government of not giving her the land promised for a petrol pump.
At the Thursday morning ceremony inside Parliament House, Ganga Devi, widow of Assistant Sub-Inspector Nanak Chand, who was among the nine people killed in the 2001 terror attack, was inconsolable. She broke down while narrating her woes to Singh and other dignitaries present. “I do not want you to pay any tributes. I am helpless and suffering from poverty,” said Ms Devi, who was invited to the function. She complained that the government had not fulfilled its promise of providing land for a petrol pump that was allotted to her.
However, Union Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Murli Deora denied the allegation, claiming that she was allotted the petrol outlet on January 25 this year.
Mr Deora told reporters here that of the nine cases, three retail outlets were commissioned in 2003, one one in 2006 and four in 2007.
“The retail outlet allotted to Ganga Devi, wife of Late Nanak Chand, was commissioned on January 25, 2007. The outlet is functioning smoothly without any problems, with the monthly sales at  40 kilo litres of petrol and 150 kilo litres of diesel. The allottee has not approached BPCL officials with any problem so far,” he said.
The minister added that he had personally reviewed the progress in commissioning the outlets and  taken up the matter of land allotment with the state chief ministers.
Vice President Hamid Ansari, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, Opposition Leader  L K Advani, Defence Minister A K Antony, Parliamentary Affairs Minister P R Dasmunshi, senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders Jaswant Singh, V K Malhotra and Sushma Swaraj were also present at the function in Parliament House.
Nine people, including security personnel from the CRPF, Parliament’s watch and ward staff, the Delhi Police and a gardener were killed in the half-hour gun-battle in the parliament complex. Five attackers of the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) terror group were also killed in the gun battle.