The poster had led to communal riots in Sangli and Kolhapur in September. The Hindu organisations have planned various functions on Tuesday at Pratapgadh.
Shivaji will dominate state politics once again — through posters of him killing Bijapur general Afzal Khan. Several Hindu organisations, including the Shiv Sena, have planned to carry out a poster campaign throughout the state on Tuesday as part of the celebrations to mark the 350th anniversary of Khan’s killing.
The poster had led to communal riots in Sangli and Kolhapur in September. The Hindu organisations have planned various functions on Tuesday at Pratapgadh, where Khan was killed, and nearby places like Wai and Jejuri. The Sena too will hold similar functions in Mumbai in the presence of its executive president Uddhav Thackeray.
The Pratapgadh Utsav Samiti (PUS) has fixed posters of Shivaji killing Afzal Khan on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway, Pune-Solapur Highway, and the Pune-Nashik Highway. The Sena has announced that party activists will fix posters outside every unit in Mumbai.
Sena chief Bal Thackeray had ordered party workers to put up similar posters across the state after the September riots. “We will organise Shivaji Maharaj’s puja,” Sena leader Subhash Desai said. “Every unit will take out a procession. We have instructed the workers to celebrate the ‘Shiv Pratap Din’ by singing povada (a patriotic song) and bursting crackers.”
“We will burst crackers at Wai at 1:30 pm - the time when Afzal Khan was killed,” PUS chief Milind Ekbote said. “The villagers will host gudhis at their homes as a symbol of the victory. Historian Ninad Bedekar and Shri Ram Sene chief Pramod Muthalik will talk on the occasion.”
Ekbote said the organisation has been celebrating the anniversary of the killing since 1996. “But this time it will be something special,” he said. “The Maharashtra government in a recent affidavit before the Bombay high court has mentioned that the tomb of Afzal Khan at Pratapgadh cannot be removed because it is a sacred monument. The affidavit has hurt our sentiments.”
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