Bengaluru: After initially rejecting it, the Union government has accepted Karnataka's Republic Day tableau tableau 'Naari Shakti'. The Basavaraj Bommai-led BJP government was under fire from the opposition Congress after the Centre rejected the Karnataka tableau for the ensuing Republic Day parade. In a letter to the Chief Secretary of Karnataka, the Union Defence Ministry said the tableau proposal of the State Government of Karnataka has been shortlisted by the Government for participating in the Republic Day Parade, 2023.
The Karnataka government had said earlier that the state did not get an opportunity to exhibit its tableau due to technical reasons. Facing flak from various quarters for dropping the Karnataka tableau from the Republic Day parade, the Ministry of Defence has now shortlisted it for participation. Many organisations including Kannada Sahitya Parishath have welcomed this move.
As per the directions issued by the Ministry of Defence (MoD), the state government has kept its tableau ready in all respects barring a few minor corrections. Facing an uphill task, the government has deployed a 50-member team in New Delhi to fix the tableau. The BJP government came under fire in poll-bound Karnataka as the state’s tableau did not feature for the first time in 13 years.
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The tableau is said to exhibit a diversity of millets in the state. Opposition leader Siddaramaiah slammed the decision to drop Karnataka’s tableau saying that it was a “reflection of how serious the BJP is about upholding the pride of Karnataka state”. Nodal officer for Republic Day tableau C R Naveen said that the Union government had issued guidelines providing opportunities to the state that had least participated (at the Republic Day parade) during the last eight years.
He said that Karnataka had presented the MoD with two themes- Naari Shakti and millet diversity while the ministry chose the former for presentation during the parade on January 26. PS Harsha, Commissioner, Department of Information and Public Relations (DIPR) said that the tableau is being made ready in record time and a team of artists and technicians has been mobilised and stationed in New Delhi.
“Working on the tableau within this short period is indeed a herculean task. As soon as we got permission, we held a meeting with the chief minister, chief secretary and other officials to chalk out a plan to complete the work within the scheduled duration. The initial and major challenge is to sculpt the concept, which itself took a lot of time. We have worked overtime to complete the tableau and have completed the task with the best quality,” Harsha said.
