Amar Jawan Jyoti at India Gate merged with National War Memorial flame

New Delhi, Jan. 21 (IANS): Amar Jawan Jyoti at iconic India Gate was merged with the flame at the National War Memorial in a military ceremony followed by a parade on Friday.

The torch bearing the flames from Amar Jawan Jyoti was carried and merged with National War Memorial in a full military tradition.

Soldiers from tri services marched carrying the flame from India Gate to the war memorial metres away from there.

Air Marshal Balabhadra Radha Krishna, Chief of Integrated Defence Staff to the Chairman Chiefs of Staff Committee (CISC), presided over the ceremony. The officer laid wreath first at Amar Jawan Jyoti and then at War Memorial. He was welcomed by three deputy chiefs in full military tradition.

Amar Jawan Jyoti was built in 1972 underneath the India Gate arch to commemorate soldiers martyred in the Indo-Pak War of 1971. It is a memorial symbolised by an inverted bayonet and soldier’s helmet over it with an eternal flame burning beside it. Amar Jawan Jyoti’s existence was questioned two years ago when National War Memorial came into existence and the nation got a new eternal flame there.