Ambedkar memorial gets nod

The long-pending issue of transferring the Indu Mills land for the Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar memorial appears to have been resolved.

The long-pending issue of transferring the Indu Mills land for the Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar memorial appears to have been resolved.

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The Union textile ministry is finished with the technical formalities and the environment department has also approved the memorial, Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan said in New Delhi on Monday. Chavan met Union textile minister Anand Sharma before making the announcement.

Chavan is likely to announce the transfer on December 5 or when lakhs of Ambedkar followers will turn up at Dadar’s Chaitya Bhoomi on December 6 to pay their respects on his death anniversary.

The decision is significant as Dalits make up about 12% of the state’s population and can influence the fate of electoral politics in 2014.

Activists of Republican Sena, an outfit led by Dr Ambedkar’s grandson Anandraj Ambedkar, had camped inside the mill premises at Prabhadevi on December 6 last year, opposing the government’s proposal to allot only 4 acres of the plot for the memorial. However, now, NTC will transfer all 12.5 acres of land.