Dinesh Kamath's news item 'Asaram Bapu’s method of celebrating in Navi Mumbai condemned by Legislators' that was published in Newsband

Asaram Bapu’s method of celebrating in Navi Mumbai condemned by Legislators

By Dinesh Kamath

NAVI MUMBAI: Legislators in the Maharashtra Legislature hit out at self-proclaimed godman Asaram Bapu for his ‘water splurge’ Holi celebrations with his followers. The entire Legislators condemned this act unanimously.  

The state government issued an order to authorities concerned to ensure that water is not provided for such events in the future. Monday’s event at Navi Mumbai was the third such event by Bapu. Bapu’s followers had brought water tankers for the Holi celebrations and sprayed the coloured water, pumped through two large nozzles, on them.

NCP MLA Jitendra Avhad threatened to take law in the hand if such wastage of water did not stop. He questioned as to how such huge quantity of water could be wasted when the state is facing one of the most severe droughts since 1973. He spoke about the poor villagers who were provided water through tankers once in a week and who had to walk several kilometres to get their share of water. ‘In such a situation, how could Bapu waste such large quantity of water?’ he asked

The protests by all the legislators led the Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan to appeal to the people to have dry Holi celebrations this year.

State Revenue Minister Balasaheb Thorat said that he has issued an order to all municipal corporations and district collectors that they should stop supplying water to Bapu’s congregation.

However, all these protests did not seem to have any effect on Asaram Bapu who justified the Holi celebrations by claiming that water sprayed had healing properties. This issue relating to wastage of water had also led to Bapu’s followers allegedly assaulting media representatives for daring to question Bapu on the misuse of water.