Himalayan News Service

Lalitpur, January 26:

Expressing concern over the cheapening of the meaning of the word ‘martyr’, martyr Dharma Bhakta Mathema’s daughter Renu Shrestha has demanded the government come up with a suitable and respectable definition befitting the contribution of the nation’s martyrs.

She said so while addressing at an interaction on the dreams of the martyrs organised by the National Press Club here today to mark the death anniversary of martyr Mathema, who attained martyrdom on this day 64 years ago. According to her, the word martyr has become so cheap that, “anybody, who died in an accident or from a fall from a hill, is called a martyr”.

But, she said, martyr is also used to describe “the real sons of the soil who fought to change the nation’s entire political system and were awarded the death penalty by the government”. President of the Martyr Memorial Committee, Prakash Dhar Sharma, said nowadays martyrs, too, have been politicised.

“We should not politicise any martyr, instead they should be nationalised,” he suggested, but said the government is indifferent towards the dreams of martyrs. Listing Mathema’s bold and courageous acts, president of the National Press Club Nepal, Ram Krishna Karmacharya, said he had also “made King Tribhuvan a member of the underground party Nepal Praja Parishad”. Talking about the present trend of remembering the martyrs once a year during Martyrs’ Day, the Communist Party of Nepal-UML leader Pradip Gyawali said people should be remember the martyrs all the time and get inspired by the lives they led.