Shivaji statue collapse: MVA holds protest, dismisses Modi's apology as 'smacking of arrogance'

The opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi on Sunday took out a march in Mumbai to protest the collapse of Shivaji Maharaj's statue and rejected Prime Minister Narendra Modi's apology over the incident, stepping up the political confrontation with the ruling Mahayuti ahead of the assembly polls.

On Sunday, 1 September MVA leaders in Mumbai hit the streets and said the PM’s apology smacked of arrogance and they would not accept it. NCP (SCP) MP Supriya Sule said she was pained by the PM’s ‘conditional apology’ tendered by the PM.

Former chief minister Uddhav Thackeray, who participated in the march from Hutatma Chowk to Gateway of India along with Sharad Pawar and Nana Patole told the gathering, “Did you notice the arrogance in the (prime minister's) apology? It smacked of arrogance…what was the PM apologising for? For the statue he inaugurated eight months ago? For the corruption involved”?

Asserting that the people of Maharashtra will never forgive the insult to the revered king, Thackeray cited the statue crash, leakages in Ram Temple and the new Parliament complex to mock Modi's "guarantees".

The march was part of the MVA’s ‘jode maaro’ (beat up with shoes) protest at the collapse of the statue.

Sharad Pawar, Uddhav Thackeray and state Congress chief Nana Patole laid wreaths at a memorial dedicated the martyrs of the joint Maharashtra agitation in south Mumbai before leading the march from Hutatma Chowk to the Gateway of India.

The statue of the 17th century Maratha warrior king at Rajkot fort in Malvan tehsil fell on August 26, over eight months after it was unveiled by PM Modi on the occasion of Navy Day.

Addressing MVA leaders and workers at the protest march, Pawar said the collapse of the statue was an example of corruption. "It is an insult to all Shiv-premis (followers of the warrior king)".

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Chief minister Eknath Shinde and deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis in turn have accused the opposition of politicising the issue. "For more than 50 years, leaders of the Congress and NCP are insulting Shivaji Maharaj. Indira Gandhi never spoke a word about Shivaji Maharaj from Red Fort, will the Congress apologise,” quipped Fadnavis while Shinde condemned attempts to politicise the issue.

Unfortunately for the BJP, the hectoring tone in the PM’s address was hard to be missed. To make it worse, he linked it to the opposition leaders (a thinly veiled reference to Rahul Gandhi) refusing to apologise for slandering Savarkar.

While the PM brought up Savarkar to salvage the damage caused by the collapse of the statue in the upcoming assembly election, the opposition has gone on the offensive, criticising the PM for offering a conditional apology.

Patole said the prime minister apologised with an eye on the upcoming elections in Maharashtra.

Several leaders from opposition parties, including Congress MP Shahu Chhatrapati, a descendant of the Maratha emperor, NCP (SP) MP Supriya Sule and MLA Anil Deshmukh, joined the protest march, which commenced after 11 am and concluded at noon.

The day the PM offered his apology, a massive protest was going on at Vadhavan, where India’s largest deep sea port is to come up with slogans of ‘Go back Modi’. The PM was forced to lay the foundation stone of the port at Palghar, 30 kilometres from Vadhavan.

Fishermen, farmers and local Adivasi communities were objecting to the project which would destroy the sensitive ecology of the area and their livelihood, they held. While the media gave wide coverage to PM Modi’s apology, there was no mention in the media of the protests a few kilometres away.

Details which have surfaced till now show that the statue was commissioned barely three months before it was unveiled; that the approval was to put up a six-feet statue but the contractor and designers were orally asked to make a 35-feet statue.

The contractor has been identified as a friend of the chief minister’s son and the statue turned out to be hollow from inside and the nuts and bolts were found to have rusted after the statue collapsed.

The Opposition was quick to draw contrast with a statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj inaugurated by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru in 1957, which still stands despite countless storms in the last 66 years. The statue in Sindhudurg was allegedly built at a cost of Rs 236 crore—and the opposition are demanding an inquiry into the process and the corruption.

(With inputs from PTI)