Venkaiah Naidu lauds Akshay Kumar for donating Rs 1.08 crore to families of Sukma bravehearts

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New Delhi: Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting M. Venkaiah Naidu on Friday praised Bollywood actor Akshay Kumar for his act of kindness, after he donated Rs. 1.08 crore to the families of the 12 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel, who lost their lives in an encounter with the Naxalites on March 11 in Chhattisgarh's Sukma district. Naidu took to his twitter handle to appreciate Kumar. kindness of  akshaykumar for donating 9 lakhs each to families of 12 CRPF jawans killed by naxals in Chhattisgarh. Inspirational— M Venkaiah Naidu (@MVenkaiahNaidu) March 17, 2017.  

Appreciate kindness of @akshaykumar for donating 9 lakhs each to families of 12 CRPF jawans killed by naxals in #Chhattisgarh. Inspirational

— M Venkaiah Naidu (@MVenkaiahNaidu) March 17, 2017

Earlier in the day, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh also commended Akshay for his generosity through his social media handle. The generosity of @akshaykumar is highly commendable. This gesture will inspire others to come forward & help the families of martyrs- Rajnath Singh (@rajnathsingh) March 16, 2017. As per the officials of the Home Ministry, soon after the incident, Kumar approached the ministry with a request to obtain the bank account numbers of the family members of the jawans who were killed in the March 11 ambush as he wanted to make a monetary donation to them. They said the Ministry, accepting Kumar's request, directed the CRPF to share the bonafide bank account numbers of the families of the slain personnel. According to ministry, Kumar transferred Rs 9 lakh each in the bank accounts yesterday. "Kumar's gesture exhibits his patriotism and devotion towards the country in general and CRPF in particular," the paramilitary force said in a statement. 12 personnel were killed in a deadly ambush in Chhattisgarh's worst Naxal-hit district of Sukma on March 11 when they were out on a patrol. The deceased CRPF personnel have been identified as Inspector Jagjit Singh, Assistant Sub-inspectors H B Bhatt and Narender Kumar Singh, head constables Jagdish Prasad Vishnoi and P R Minde and constables Mangesh Pal Pandey, Rampal Singh Yadav, Goraknath, Nand Kumar Patra, Satish Kumar Verma, K Shankar and Suresh Kumar. The troops belonged to the 219th battalion of the force deployed in the state for conducting anti-Naxal operations. The 'Khiladi' fame actor had also recently met Union Home Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi expressing his desire to contribute to the security forces and also with a plan to develop an smartphone app (application) so that any citizen can donate money to the family of those needy jawans or officers who get killed in the line of duty.