Nagpur: The more than 200-year-old Kamptee Cantonment shed its colonial legacy this Independence Day. Clive Road that commemorated the first British Governor General Robert Clive has been renamed Captain Jasbir Singh Raina Road. Napier Road, named in memory of a British commander who led the Sindh campaign, has now become Naik Jadunath Singh Road. White Road in the cantonment has been named after another Indian war hero, Albert Ekka. The trio belong to the Brigade of Guards regiment, which has a training centre in Kamptee.The renaming is part of the larger mandate to change British-time symbols that have been a part of the armed forces even post-independence, said sources. Raina was conferred with the Ashok Chakra — the highest peacetime gallantry award for his bravery in Operation Blue Star. Raina played a key role in flushing out militants from the Golden Temple complex. Dressed as a civilian pilgrim, he went inside the temple complex and came up with crucial information on the militants. Later, he led an attack to flush them out and was critically injured. Jadunath Singh took part in the first India-Pakistan war of 1947 and bravely held out against an attack by the numerically stronger enemy. Lance Naik Albert Ekka took part in the 1971 war and got the gallantry award posthumously for silencing an enemy machine gun position. The renamed streets are part of internal roads in Kamptee cantonment.When the matter came up before the Cantonment Board meeting, there was also a proposal to name the roads after Swami Vivekananda Road and Raja Raghuji Bhosale. While Vivekananda had passed through The Mall — a heritage road in the cantonment — on his way to Ramtek, the Maratha king had donated land to the British for building the cantonment. However, since the proposals to name the roads after Capt Raina, Naik Singh and Lance Naik Ekka were sent in 2022, the final approval from higher authorities had come, said a nominated member of the cantonment, Kamal Kishore Yadav. The decision has been amicably accepted, he said.The Brigade of the Guards, India’s first all-class, mixed-composition infantry regiment and the brainchild of Field Marshal K M Cariappa, established its permanent Regimental Centre in Kamptee in October 1976 after moving from Kota.
