The Public Works Department will continue to maintain the statue of late AIADMK leader and former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on the campus of the Tamil Nadu State Council for Higher Education, the government said on Thursday.
It contended that handing over the maintenance of statues to private individuals or organisations was not in practice.
In a statement, Higher Education Minister K. Ponmudi was responding to an appeal made by AIADMK coordinator O. Panneerselvam to allow his party to undertake the maintenance of the statue of the former Chief Minister.
Usual practice
“It has been the practice to honour freedom fighters and leaders by paying floral tributes on the birth and death anniversaries of those personalities. In future too, floral tributes would be paid to the statue of former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on her birth anniversary on February 24,” Mr. Ponmudi said.
The site where the statue of the former Chief Minister had been installed was being maintained by the Public Works Department, the Minister pointed out, and added that the PWD and the local bodies had been maintaining all statues that had been installed by the State government.