Statues of former prime ministers Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi were unveiled Thursday at Lal Darwaja, 12 years after those were installed on a busy traffic island near Roopalee Cinema — the city’s iconic movie theatre that is now being pulled down. The event was to mark the 71st birth anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi on Thursday. These are the only statues of Indira and Rajiv in the city. [related-post] The statues, sculpted by Dhananjay Mudholkar, were installed in 2003-04 when Congress was in power in the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC). However, they were not unveiled. Congress was unhappy with the look of the statues and wanted them to be replaced. It hired another sculptor, the late Jashuben Shilpi, for making the new statues. In the meantime, BJP came to power in the AMC. Since then, Congress could never get clearance from the ruling BJP at the AMC for re-installing them. The statues made by Jashuben continue to remain in the sculptor’s workshop. The two original statues were unveiled in a low-key event which was attended by state Congress chief Bharatsinh Solanki, city unit president Chetan Raval, former mayor Himmatsinh Patel, leader of opposition in the AMC Badruddin Shaikh and others. “Initially, the unveiling of these statues was put off because overall impact of the work was not satisfactory. Thus, on suggestion from the party workers, we decided to get these replaced with better ones,” said former AMC mayor Himmatsinh Patel. Congress spokesperson Manish Doshi said: “There were some major faults in the making of these statues. The installation ceremony remained pending with the wait for a Congress government as for all these years.” While Mudholkar cast the statues on behalf of the AMC, Congress spent Rs 15 lakh from its own fund for the replacements when BJP gained control of the civic body in 2005. “On July 17, I wrote a letter seeking permission from the mayor that the statues were ready and we want to replace these with the new ones. Since the permission is still awaited, we decided to unveil the original statues to pay tributes to Rajiv Gandhi on his birth anniversary,” said Badruddin Shaikh.
