Weighing more than 400 kilograms, golden and the equivalent of 14,000 euros: In the Indian state of Goa, people did not spoil themselves with a statue in honor of the Portuguese soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo.
But instead of enthusiasm, the plant in the city of Calangute is now causing trouble.
As local media and the IANS news agency report, there were protests with black flags on site one day after the statue was inaugurated.
"To erect the statue of a Portuguese footballer this year is outrageous," IANS quoted the right-wing activist Guru Shirodkar, according to the BBC.
The statue is an insult to the freedom fighters in Goa.
On the official side, they want to understand the erection of the statue differently.
It was built to promote the love of football and to inspire young people, wrote Michael Lobo, a minister of the affected state of Goa on Twitter.
Boys and girls would look up to the statue and take selfies on the work, the minister told IANS.
As the BBC reports, critics also criticize the timing of the inauguration.
This year, the state of Goa is celebrating 60 years of independence from the former colonial power Portugal.
Goa only gained freedom years after the end of the British occupation of India.
According to the BBC, soccer is particularly popular in the state, and many people have families in Portugal or lived there themselves.
The Portuguese national team is also popular in Goa.
Minister Lobo said of the protests against IANS that "these people" simply hated football.
In India, cricket is by far the most popular sport.
Despite its size - with more than 1.3 billion inhabitants - the country is worse at football than many other countries, Lobo told the ANI press agency.
fek / dpa
