Odisha celebrates Netaji's birth anniversary

Odisha Thursday celebrated the 117th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, founder of the Indian National Army, with floral tributes, devotional songs, meetings and rallies.

Leaders of political parties visited Cuttack, 26 km from here, where Bose was born in 1897 and garlanded the freedom fighter's statue.

Thousands, including school children, visited Janakinath Bhavan, the ancestral house of Bose, now a museum. It houses furniture and photographs of the Bose family and a sand sculpture of Bose.

The Odia translation of "An Indian Pilgrim," an unfinished autobiography by Bose, was released at a function organised by the administration at his birthplace.

Prominent among those who visited the museum were Bharatiya Janata Party president Rajnath Singh and Odisha ministers.

Statues of Bose were also garlanded in other cities.

Netaji spent his early childhood in Cuttack. He studied at the Ravenshaw Collegiate School and later went to Calcutta -- now Kolkata -- for higher studies.