Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati on Thursday warned that if the monuments and memorial sites dedicated to the Bahujan Samaj Party icons here were demolished, a serious law and order situation would be created in the country. President's rule would have to be imposed. "The Congress and the Samajwadi Party would be responsible for this,” she said.
She was addressing a gathering after laying the foundation stone of the Manyavar Shri Kanshi Ramji Green ( Eco) Garden here on Thursday.
Denying that her government violated the Supreme Court's orders on suspending construction work at the memorial sites, Ms. Mayawati accused the Samajwadi Party and the Congress of indulging in “malicious and mischievous propaganda.”
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She accused a section of the media of presenting “wrong facts” pertaining to work at the memorial sites and cautioned the media against becoming a tool in the Opposition game-plan. The Chief Secretary had submitted an affidavit in the apex court. She said work was going on only at those sites against which no writ petitions had been filed and no stay granted by the apex court.
The Chief Minister dubbed the Congress 'anti-Dalit' and said thousands of crores of rupees have been spent on building memorials, parks, statues and museums in the name of members of the Gandhi and Nehru families. “It seems eminent persons belong only to these two families and when crores have been spent on building memorials for them the Congress does not say that money has been misused.”
Ms. Mayawati said that had memorial sites of Dalit icons been built by the Congress during its 50 years of rule at the Centre and about 40 years in Uttar Pradesh, there would have been no need for the BSP government to do so. “The money spent by her government on building memorial sites was peanuts compared to the funds used in building such sites for members of the Nehru and Gandhi families,” she said.
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She attacked the Congress government in Maharashtra for announcing the decision to build a statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji in the sea a few days before the Assembly elections were announced. The BSP wanted Shivaji to be honoured but the Congress should also adopt a non-partisan stand on the Noida park issue.
Ms. Mayawati said the Noida park was being built on the appeal of the Dalits of Uttar Pradesh settled in Delhi.
Taking a dig at the UPA government's austerity move, she termed the use of economy class (by Sonia Gandhi) and train journey (by Rahul Gandhi ) as “natakbaazi” (drama). She slammed Samajwadi president Mulayam Singh for singing the same tune as the Congress, which displayed his anti-Dalit mentality.
She alleged that in 2005 (when Mulayam was in power), the Bhimrao Ambedkar memorial at Gomtinagar was shown as falling in the green belt in the Lucknow Master Plan. The status quo was restored when the BSP came to power in 2007.
Since then, the SP has been searching for alibis to demolish the monument, Ms. Mayawati alleged. The Green Eco Garden is being developed on 160 acres on which the old Lucknow jail once stood. It is a gift to the people of Lucknow and the first of its kind in the country. She clarified that the function was not a party one but a government programme.