LONDON: A statue of Mahatma Gandhi is on a secret list of 32 “contentious statues in London” held by Scotland Yard. Other statues on the list, which the Metropolitan police says are at risk of being attacked by protesters, include the statue of former UK PM Winston Churchill, and the statues of Robert Clive and Louis Mountbatten, the last Viceroy of India.
Gandhi’s statue in Parliament Square features because “social media indicates there is controversy regarding some of Gandhi’s remarks about black South Africans”, the list states.
The list was obtained via a Freedom of Information request to the Metropolitan police by London think tank Policy Exchange as part of its research into rising squalor and declining order around the Palace of Westminster. The list appears as a footnote in its report “Tarnished Jewel“, which documents how police have allowed security threats to develop in the area and how crime has risen. Churchill features on the list because he referred to British imperialism as being for the good of the “primitive” and “subject races”.
The statue of Lord Mountbatten is a possible target because “after India gained Independence, Lord Mountbatten oversaw the partition of several provinces, which led to the deaths of nearly two million people and the displacement of nearly twenty million”, the notes state.
Gandhi’s statue in Parliament Square features because “social media indicates there is controversy regarding some of Gandhi’s remarks about black South Africans”, the list states.
The list was obtained via a Freedom of Information request to the Metropolitan police by London think tank Policy Exchange as part of its research into rising squalor and declining order around the Palace of Westminster. The list appears as a footnote in its report “Tarnished Jewel“, which documents how police have allowed security threats to develop in the area and how crime has risen. Churchill features on the list because he referred to British imperialism as being for the good of the “primitive” and “subject races”.
The statue of Lord Mountbatten is a possible target because “after India gained Independence, Lord Mountbatten oversaw the partition of several provinces, which led to the deaths of nearly two million people and the displacement of nearly twenty million”, the notes state.