UP DGP A.C. Sharma has said that those guilty of vandalising Ms Mayawati’s statue would be firmly punished.
He told reporters that the police had taken three persons into custody. These three persons, including one person of a PR agency, were responsible for organising the press conference in which the UP Navnirman Sena announced its decision to break the statues of former chief minister.
Meanwhile, BSP activists have started spilling out on to the streets to protest against Ms Mayawati’s statue being vandalised.
Protests have been held in Jhansi, Lucknow, Hardoi, Muzaffarnagar, Ambedkar Nagar, Sultanpur, Azamgarh, Kanpur and Meerut. According to reports, BSP workers have started staging protests in Dehradun, Uttarakhand, as well and the police had to resort to use force to control the mob.
In Lucknow, the top state leadership of the BSP led by Leader of the Opposition Swami Prasad Maurya, former minister Naseemuddin Siddiqui, state president Ram Achal Rajbhar and former minister Nakul Dubey began an indefinite fast in front of Vidhan Sabha, demanding immediate action against those responsible for the incident.
Terming it as a planned conspiracy to disturb social harmony, the DGP said that a case under 153A, 295 IPC and under Section 3 of Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act had been registered against unnamed persons.
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Another Maya Statue being put up at site
Age correspondent
Lucknow, July 26
Another statue of former chief minister Mayawati is now being installed at the site where one of her statue was vandalised on Thursday afternoon.
In order to placate angry BSP workers, district magistrate Anurag Yadav ordered that the statue kept in Sangeet Natak Academy should be immediately installed at the site opposite Ambedkar Park.
Work on this is likely to be completed before Friday morning when thousands of BSP activists are expected to arrive here to see the statue.