Shivaji statue collapse: Maharashtra police arrests structural consultant 

Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj statue collapse: The structural consultant, who was involved in the creation of the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj statue that collapsed earlier this week, has been arrested. The Maharashtra government was left red-faced after the statue that was inaugurated last year with much fanfare collapsed even before it completed a year. The government also received severe criticism from all quarters, prompting Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde to say on Thursday that he was willing to apologise 100 times.

The structural consultant of the Shivaji statue, Chetan Patil, was apprehended in the early hours of Friday in a joint operation by Kolhapur crime branch and Malvan police. He was then transferred to the Malvan police custody. Patil had previously denied being the structural consultant of the statue, and claimed that he was only tasked with working on the platform, while a Thane-based company handled the statue-related work. 

The 35-foot statue of the 17th-century Maratha warrior king at Rajkot fort in Sindhudurg's Malvan collapsed at 1pm on Monday, less than nine months after its unveiling by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. 

Shinde, at the receiving end of the flak, said that the opposition should keep the warrior king out of their politics. "Chhatrapati Shivaji is a patron deity of Maharashtra. I am ready to touch his feet 100 times and apologise (for the statue collapse in Sindhudurg). I will not shy away from apologising. Our government functions keeping his (Shivaji's) ideals in mind," he said. 

The CM had earlier said that it was the Indian Navy who had constructed the statue, while his minister said that the government had paid Rs 2.36 crore to the Navy for the installation of the statue, but had minimal involvement in the creation of the statue. 

The Indian Navy issued a statement and deployed a team to immediately investigate the cause for the collapse, steps to repair, restore and reinstate the statue.

The Maharashtra government also set up a technical committee to find out why the statue toppled. 

Meanwhile, members of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), led by Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, also staged silent protests across Maharashtra over the incident.