MOSCOW: Moscow authorities on Thursday unveiled a large panel featuring Joseph Stalin inside a central metro station in the Russian capital.

The Kremlin has for years pushed to rehabilitate the dictator, promoting an ultra-patriotic version of history that glosses over Soviet-era repression. A few small Stalin busts and statues have been erected across Russia in recent years, but mostly on private premises and in smaller towns.

Large Stalin depictions have, so far, been unprecedented in the heart of the capital. The panel bearing the Georgian-born Soviet dictator, unveiled inside the central Taganskaya station, is a replica of the “People’s Gratitude to the Leader and Commander”.

That original was destroyed in the 1960s during the de-Stalinisation policy under Stalin’s successor, Nikita Khrushchev. “We are restoring a lost historical bas-relief dedicated to victory in the Great Patriotic War,” the Moscow metro said on May 10, using Russia’s name for World War Two.

It showed the moustached dictator standing in military tunic, surrounded by children and workers who are looking at and reaching out to him. The profile of another Russian Communist ruler, Vladimir Lenin, is depicted over Stalin.

Taganskaya station was opened in 1950, a heyday of Stalin’s personality cult in the Soviet Union, and the bas-relief was a typical representation of the dictator during those times. The reconstruction of the monument was not announced by the authorities until it was unveiled, according to Russian independent media.

Published in Dawn, May 16th, 2025