Shinde said that the Opposition, which he said was spreading rumors that the state government was protecting Apte, was dealt with a severe blow by the police's arrest of him on Wednesday night.
Apte and his consultant Chetan Patil were produced before the court by the Sindhudurg police.
According to the Sindhudurg police, questioning was necessary to ascertain what kind of materials were used in the construction and design of the 35-foot statue. Both have been placed under arrest supervision until September 10. While Apte was taken into custody on Wednesday night from Kalyan in the Thane district, approximately ten days after a police report was filed in relation to the incident, Patil was arrested on August 30 from Kolhapur.
The Sindhudurg police informed the court that the materials taken from the statue were rusted and that it was necessary to determine whether the accused had used inferior quality items.
Almost nine months after Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled it on Navy Day, the statue at the Rajkot Fort in Malvan tehsil of the district collapsed on August 26. In their request for remand, the police stated that they must question the defendant to learn where they got the statue's construction materials from and whether or not they were of poor quality.