Lucknow, July 27 : Hours after a huge marble statue of Mayawati was broken, the government installed a new one in place of it at the Ambedkar Park here.
The gesture is an attempt by chief minister Akhilesh Yadav to keep the calm in his capital.
It was a tense day for the capital of Uttar Pradesh after the four-foot-high statue was destroyed by vandals.
The head and hands were hammered out, so was the replica of the large purse that Mayawati is rarely seen without. Three persons including a Samajwadi Party worker Amit Jain, have been detained in connection with the incident, police said.
The replica was created for another memorial in Lucknow - the Kanshi Ram Green Eco Garden - but was never installed.
By late evening, the state government had replaced the damaged statue with a fresh one.
When the attack on the statue was reported, the former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh appealed to her party workers not to retaliate. Pamphlets left behind at the damaged statue referred to a group called the UP Navnirman Sena.
The statue was placed outside the Ambedkar Memorial constructed by Mayawati as a tribute to Dalit leaders including herself and her mentor, Kanshi Ram.
The statues that Mayawati commissioned were widely criticised during her term in office - she was also taken to court to explain why taxpayers were funding her replicas.
When 39-year-old Akhilesh Yadav defeated her in the state elections earlier this year, he promised that her statues would not be broken.
In Mathura, the vandalising of Mayawati's statue triggered off violence in the district as an infuriated mob yesterday damaged several vehicles plying on Mathura-Aligarh road and set ablaze two tankers and a state roadways bus in the Laxmi Nagar area.
Prior to the agitation on the Mathura-Aligarh road, the protesters forced the shopkeepers of the area to observe a shut down in the market areas.
“Teargas shells and rubber bullets had to be used to disperse the mob which went on a rampage and set two tankers and a roadways bus ablaze,” Chief Development Officer N K Paliwal, who is holding the charge of District Magistrate said.
Violence broke out in Laxmi Nagar area under Jamuna Paar police station on Mathura-Aligarh road, and despite repeated warning by the police the protesters refused to withdraw the agitation, Paliwal said.
Annoyed locals blocked the traffic movement on the important Mathura-Aligarh route, which was later cleared on the assurances given by senior police officials.
