CJI Sanjiv Khanna still tries to find the house built by his grandfather.
New Delhi:
Justice Sanjiv Khanna, who took oath as the 51st Chief Justice of the country today, is on the trail of his “missing” ancestral home in Amritsar. The pre-Independence era house was built by his grandfather, Sarav Dayal.
Sources close to Chief Justice Khanna revealed that whenever he visits Amritsar, he visits Katra Sher Singh. The stop-over is a pilgrimage of sorts. With time, the area has changed, but Justice Khanna still tries to find the house built by his grandfather.
Chief Justice Khanna’s grandfather and legendary Justice HR Khanna’s father Sarav Dayal was a celebrated lawyer of his time, sources said. He was included in the Congress committee formed for the Jallianwala Bagh incident of 1919.
Around that time, he had bought two houses – one in Katra Sher Singh near Jallianwala Bagh, and the second in Dalhousie, Himachal Pradesh. It is the Katra Sher Singh house that Justice Khanna is trying to locate.
At the time of independence in 1947, the house in Katra Sher Singh was desecrated and set on fire. But later, his grandfather got it restored.
When Chief Justice Khanna was five years old, he once visited that house with his father. The house bore a sign that read ‘Bauji’, meaning “Grandfather”. This sign is still kept at the house in Dalhousie. According to sources, after the death of Sarav Dayal, the house in Amritsar was sold in 1970.
Chief Justice Khanna remembers that house till date. So whenever he goes to Amritsar, he visits Katra Sher Singh and tries to look for that house.
Chief Justice Khanna always recalls how his grandfather used to tell him not to bring school books during holidays because the education he would impart would not be found even in books.