Mumbai: Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray has criticised the state government for construction of the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj memorial in the Arabian Sea, off the Mumbai coast.
Mr Thackeray said that instead of spending thousands of crores of rupees on the Shivaji memorial, the state government should have repaired the Maratha warrior king’s forts. “Shivshahi or good governance will not come only by constructing a statue of Shivaji Maharaj in the sea,” he said.
Mr Thackeray continued his tirade saying that the state government was just flaunting the memorial, but actually had no money to construct the same.
Mr Thackeray told reporters that the state government was misguiding the people of Maharashtra and questioned as to where the money was that was earlier promised by the BJP-led government for the development of Mumbai. He said that his party had done a lot of development work in Nashik and, therefore, he would be in Nashik for the next two to three days.
Ever since Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday performed bhoomi pujan of the Shivaji memorial, to be constructed on a 16-hectare-long rock in the Arabian Sea off the Mumbai coastline, the Congress and NCP have been criticising the state government. The latest to jump into the fray are Mr Thackeray and activist Karishma Upadhyay, who has filed an online petition against the upcoming memorial.
“This is tax payers’ money and I am sure we would all like this money to be spent on something better, such as education, infrastructure, and food… anything but a statue that is of no use to anyone. This is not what Shivaji would have wanted and I am sure we can find other ways to honour him,” Ms Upadhyay said on the website change.org. She further stated that apart from a waste of money, the statue was going to be terrible for the environment, for the traffic situation in south Mumbai, and a security nightmare.
