NCP leader trades charges at LS Secretariat for delay in installatio

Kolhapur, Feb 3 (UNI) Veteran NCP leader and former MLC Baburao Dharwade today charged the Lok Sabha Secretariat with delaying the installation of the statue of social reformer Rajarshi Chhatrapati Shahu Maharaj in Parliament premises.

Addressing a news conference here, Mr Dharwade, who is also Bhai Mahdhavrao Bagal Vidhyapeet chief, alleged that the delay by the Secretariat was nothing but disrespect to the great reformer and warned that the party would launch intense agitation if the authority concerned failed to take immediate action on the installation and unveiling of the statue.

The decision to instal a life-size statue of Rajarshi Chhatrapati Shahu Maharaj in the premises of Parliament was taken by the then Lok Sabha speaker Manohar Joshi. And sculptor Ram Sutar of Utter Pradesh has prepared the statue, for which the Maharashtra government had already paid lakhs of rupees, he pointed out.

Mr Dharwade said he had written to various leaders including Mr Joshi, Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, Prime Minister's Office Minister Prithiviraj Chavan, Union Energy Minister Sushilkumar Shinde and Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, several times for early installation of the statue but no action has been initiated so far, he lamented.

The representatives of Bhai Madhavrao Bagal Vidhyapeet, who are pressing for an early installation of Rajarshi Chhatrapati Shahu Maharaj's statue, will once again meet Mr Pawar shortly in this connection, before undertaking agitation, he added.

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