Udaipur : Members of Karni Sena, the fringe group who assaulted director Sanjay Leela Bansali in Jaipur a month ago, vandalized Padmini Palace in Chittorgarh fort, a world heritage site on Sunday. The hooligans entered into the fort pretending as tourists and broke the ‘heritage mirrors’ which is believed to be the ones through which Allaudin Khilji is supposed to have seen the beautiful queen Padmini’s reflection in water by her palace. During the vandalization, there were many tourists who witnessed the incident. One of them rushed out and reported the matter to the authorities. The Palace is a protected monument by the Archeological Survey of India and on a complaint given by the Conservation Assistant Premchand Sharma, a case has been registered against unidentified persons and an investigation is on, police said. No one was quizzed or taken in custody till evening.

Rajput outfit Karni Sena has taken the responsibility of this incident. “ A fortnight ago, the members of Shri Rajput Karni Sena had given a memorandum to the ASI authorities to remove the mirrors from the palace walls as they believed that these had been put up by the ASI to create a tourist interest. There were no such mirrors and these were misrepresenting the honour of the legendry Rajput queen who committed ‘Jauhar’ and set herself on fire to protect herself from Khilji who attacked Chittorgarh in 1303 after hearing of stories of her beauty” sources said. “ We had told them if they do not remove the mirrors, we will do it. They didn’t pay heed to our warnings” said Govind Singh Khangarot, the district president of Shri Rajput Karni Sena, Chittorgarh. Its surprising that despite a police chowky inside the fort premises, the trouble makers dared to get inside the palace and shattered 3 mirrors publicly that were installed on three sides of the spherical chamber.

Remove the mirror episode from light&sound show, texts

Meanwhile, the group has not restrained itself after the Sunday act. On Monday, few members of the group allegedly met the ASI staff and warned them to remove the objectionable ‘mirror episode between Khilji & Padmini’ from the script of the light and sound show at Chittor fort. The group has warned violent protest on March 12, if their demands weren’t fulfilled. Meanwhile, police authorities expressed ignorance of any such development. “ I am out of station and hence not aware of the incident” said Udaipur IG Anand Srivastava. Additional SP Rajan Dushyant said the case is under investigation and no one has been arrested yet. “ Nothing of such warning has come to my information” he said to Udaipur Kiran.