Mumbai: Actor Amitabh Bachchan says the controversy over his presence at the inauguration of the second phase of the Bandra-Worli sea link in Mumbai was "manufactured".
"A fresh controversy has been rapidly manufactured on my involvement. The media has been hounding me since the event at the sea link has got over, through incessant SMSes and the electronic (media) has followed me even to the theatre where we were seeing Arshad's film," Bachchan wrote in a midnight post on his blog. Actor Arshad Warsi's film Hum Tum Aur Ghost will be released this week.
The Congress party is upset at Bachchan’s presence at to the inauguration on Wednesday, as he is not on good terms with the Gandhi family and is the brand ambassador of BJP-ruled Gujarat.
The event to inaugurate the sea link was organised by the state Public Works Department Ministry, which is headed by Congress' coalition partner NCP. Chief Minister Ashok Chavan has expressed his displeasure at Bachchan’ present at the event.
"As it was a government function, adequate care should have been taken about the invitations being sent," Chavan has said.
Bachchan said he would comment on the controversy later. "But of that (sic) some other time and space," he wrote.
NCP controls the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC), the implementing agency of the sea link.
Several Congress leaders said they were not aware that Bachchan would be present at the function. The actor's name was not there on the invitation card, they said.
However, Public Undertakings Minister Jaidutt Kshirsagar, who is also chairperson of the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation, justified the decision to invite Bachchan because he was an "icon".
"Bachchan and Sachin Tendulkar are icons and I thought it fit that their presence was required at the inauguration of this iconic bridge," he said.
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