London: Movie heavyweight Lord Attenborough today pledged his support for the installation of a statue of Mahatma Gandhi in Leicester, about 100 km from here.

Member of the House of Lords, Attenborough won the Academy Award in 1982 for directing his historical epic, Gandhi.

Lord Attenborough has long been associated with the city of Leicester and has pledged to support its promotion of equality.

A Gandhi statue would celebrate his life and work as a leading figure of non-violent resistance and as a champion of inter-cultural harmony and cooperation in what is likely to be Britain's first white minority city by 2012, he said.

A Gandhi statue is seen as a symbol of the multicultural harmony that Leicester is famous for across Europe, Indian origin MP Keith Vaz, who is the prime mover of the proposal to install the statue said today.
Source : PTI