State relief for Ganesh mandals this year

The main gate for the pandal of Lalbaugcha Raja being prepared. Pic/Ashish Raje

Ganesh mandals and their representatives, who were booked in the past for flouting laws, will be given relief. The cases against them will be withdrawn through a government-appointed committee that has been formed for the purpose. For the upcoming festival, the deadline for submitting applications has been extended by three days to September 5.

This was decided at a joint meeting of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, the police, civic officials from major cities, Mumbai BJP president Ashish Shelar and representatives of Ganesh mandals.

It has also been decided that documents submitted by mandals this year will be digitised so that they don't need to submit them every year. As the mandals have to seek six different permissions, it was decided to provide a single window facility.

There are 6,212 mandals across the state, which the representatives contested and demanded a recount of, because they believed there were more operating in the cities and towns. Relief has been extended to mandals that had been denied permission this year by reviewing their cases.

The representatives wanted civic authorities to repair roads with immediate effect and asked the government to set a deadline for this job. Also, the repeated demand for allowing loudspeakers till midnight on five days instead of four was raised yet again. No decision has been taken on it yet. They also sought permission to hold religious programmes without speakers after 10 pm at the pandals.

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