IANS

Panaji, Apr 9: The Goa government and the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) are set to demolish a statue of the state's first chief minister Dayanand Bandodkar, leader of opposition Manohar Parrikar said Thursday.

Addressing a press conference in Panaji, Parrikar said haphazard expansion of the national highway (NH) 4a linking Goa with Karnataka will result in demolition of Bandodkar's statue at Farmagudi in Ponda taluka, 25 km from here.

Parrikar, Bharatiya Janata Party leader and a former chief minister himself, said: "The expansion of the NH 4a by the NHAI is so unplanned that they are set to demolish the statue of Bandodkar in his centenary year."

Born on March 12, 1911, Dayanand Bandodkar, a mine owner, ruled the state for nearly a decade and is best known for his efforts - as the chief of the regional party Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) - to merge Goa into the neighbouring state of Maharashtra.

Parrikar alleged that the hasty expansion of the highway, for connecting Goa with north Karnataka's commercial district of Belgaum, will also result in demolition of several religious structures, including the Safa mosque in Ponda, protected by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI).