US expresses 'sincere apologies' over desecration of Gandhi statue in Washington

US ambassador to India Ken Juster on Thursday (4) apologised for desecration of a statue of Mahatma Gandhi outside the Indian embassy in Washington DC.

Unknown miscreants vandalised the statue with graffiti and by spraying paint, prompting the Indian embassy officials to register a complaint with the local law enforcement agencies.

The incident is reported to have taken place on the intervening night of June 2 and 3.

"So sorry to see the desecration of the Gandhi statue in Wash, DC. Please accept our sincere apologies. Appalled as well by the horrific death of George Floyd & the awful violence & vandalism. We stand against prejudice & discrimination of any type. We will recover & be better," Juster tweeted.

The vandalism of the statue of Gandhi took place in the midst of the nationwide protests in the US against the killing of African-American George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25.

Several of the protests have turned violent which many times has resulted in damage of some prestigious and sacred monuments.

In Washington DC, protesters this week burnt a historic church and damaged some of the prime properties and historic places like the national monument and Lincoln Memorial.

The Indian embassy had informed the US State Department and registered a complaint with local law enforcement agencies.

One of the few statues of a foreign leader on a federal land in Washington DC, the statue of Mahatma Gandhi was dedicated by the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, in the presence of the then US president Bill Clinton on September 16, 2000 during his state visit to the US.

In October 1998, the US Congress had authorised the government of India to establish and maintain a memorial “to honour Mahatma Gandhi on Federal land in the District of Columbia."

According to the Indian Embassy website, the sculpture of Mahatma Gandhi is cast in bronze as a statue to a height of 8 feet 8 inches. It shows Gandhi in stride, as a leader and man of action evoking memories of his 1930 protest march against salt-tax, and the many padyatras (long marches) he undertook throughout the length and breadth of the Indian sub-continent.

The statue, the design of which was created by Gautam Pal, is a gift from the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR). The pedestal for the statue of Mahatma Gandhi is a block of new Imperial Red also known as Ruby Red a block originally weighing 25 tonnes reduced to a size of 9''x7''x3''4". It now weighs 16 tonnes.