Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati penned an emotional letter to the Supreme Court on Tuesday (April 2) on why life-size statues of her as well as the party symbol, elephant, at various places in Uttar Pradesh during her tenure as UP chief minister.
The Supreme Court is hearing a petition filed in 2009 by an advocate who had alleged that about Rs 2,000 crore was used from the state budget for 2008-09 and 2009-10, when Mayawati was the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, for stalling her statues and BSP’s symbol at different places.
Replying through an affidavit, Mayawati said she had “dedicated her entire life for the upliftment of the downtrodden”. She also said that the statues represented the “will of the people”.
Mayawati was responding to the notice and the oral observation of the apex court which had on February 8 observed that Mayawati should deposit public money used for erecting statues of herself and the party’s symbol to the state exchequer.
She wrote that in her service of the people she had even “remained unmarried”.
“I dedicated my entire life for the upliftment of the downtrodden and for achieving this, I also took a decision to remain unmarried,” Mayawati wrote in her affidavit.
According to the affidavit, the decision to build statues came through the state legislature. The motive behind erecting statues of Mayawati was to “show their respect to contemporary women Dalit leader who has decided to sacrifice her life for the cause of underprivileged communities”.
Mayawati said, “Certainly I could not go contrary to the wishes of the state legislators in installing my statue near the statues of Shri Kanshi Ram.”
Mayawati sought dismissal of the plea, which has alleged that public fund was misused, saying it was “politically motivated” and is in gross abuse of the process of the court. She said that issues related to utilisation of funds for a particular public purpose by the state government are “not justiciable” and funds for construction of these memorials and installation of statues were sanctioned through budgetary allocation after approval of the budget by the state legislature.