Krishna Janmashtami: Raj Thackeray's MNS chooses god over SC, ties 'dahi handi' at 49 ft

Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena on Thursday brazenly defied a Supreme Court order limiting the height of human pyramids to 20 feet formed during the Dahi Handi festival to mark Krishna Janmashtami by tying a ‘dahi handi’ 49 feet above the ground. [caption id=“attachment_2387196” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray. Parag Shinde/Firstpost[/caption] The Supreme Court had on Wednesday rejected a fresh plea filed by the Jai Jawan Krida Mandal Govinda Pathak in a last ditch attempt to get over the restriction. The organisation argued that now that the youth below 18 years of age have been barred from participating in the Dahi Handi ritual, the cap on the height of the human pyramid should be relaxed as adventure is part of every sport. The Supreme Court was however unconvinced by the argument. “The organiser of the Janmashtami celebrations for the party, Avinash Jadhav, confirmed that the dahi handi was tied on the orders from the party’s leader Raj Thackeray, who reportedly told workers to celebrate the festival the way it was meant to be celebrated,” said a piece published in the Local Press. If the 49-feet-high handi in Thane is broken, it would ironically be a Guinness World Record bettering the earlier record of 43 feet held by the Mumbai-based Jai Jawan group. So much for the audacity of Jadhav, his T-shirt, according to NDTV, read “I will break the law” in Marathi. The Times of India reported that the 49 feet ‘dahi handi’ was even named suggestively. It was called the ‘Kayda-bhang’ (law-breaking pyramid). A 12-year-old boy is also likely to be on the top of the pyramid which will clearly violate the apex court order prohibiting anyone below 18 years of age to participate in the acrobatic celebrations of Krishna Janmashtami. With the state determined to enforce the Supreme Court order with the police issuing preemptive notices and making arrangements to video record every human pyramid, it will be interesting to see how the open challenge of the MNS will move forward.

Thane (Maharashtra): An MNS worker wearing a t-shirt which reads "I will break the law". #DahiHandi #Janmashtami pic.twitter.com/QG7USlGiGk

— ANI (@ANI) August 25, 2016

While all parties seemed upset, the MNS has been quite vocal about the restrictions. Earlier, the MNS president even took on the Supreme Court for the curbs and asked party workers to celebrate the festival as they have been celebrating it for all these years.