Gopal Chinayya Shetty is a Mangalore based Indian politician. He is a member of parliament from Mumbai North. Previously, he was a 2 terms Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) from the Borivali Vidhan Sabha constituency and 3 terms Corporator of Brihanmumbai Mahanagar Corporation (BMC) from 1992-2004. He is currently the Member of Parliament for Mumbai-North constituency.

He was the president of the Mumbai unit of Bharatiya Janata Party.^[1]

He has also served the Bharatiya Janata Party in various capacities from Mandal secretary to the president of Mumbai BJP.

In 2016, Shetty surrendered public land, including the Poinsur Gymkhana, Kamla Vihar Sports Complex and Veer Savarkar Udyan plots, which had been directly or indirectly placed under his control.^[2][3]

Gopal Shetty, BJP candidate, won in 2019 Indian general elections against Congress party (INC)candidate Urmila Matondkar in North constituency of Mumbai by a whopping margin of 4,65,247 votes and had gained the record of getting highest number of votes in Maharashtra during 2019 election.^[4][5]

He has taken active participation in all the initiatives of PM Narendra Modi. Mumbai Local trains are lifeline of Mumbai and Borivali is a major junction which is starting point for Western Railway locals and stopping point for all the major long distance trains. Gopal Shetty was active in implementing various facilities for travelers like escalators, elevators and Foot over Bridges (FOB's) at Borivali Railway Station.

Borivali "The Suburb of Gardens"

Borivali can be called as the garden suburb as it had one of the National Park with Kanheri Caves. Now in last 10-15 years it has been a suburb with a bouquets of garden due to the efforts of Shri Gopal Shetty the MLC, MLA and then MP of this area.

His strong point is that he is risen from a grass-root worker to BMC corporator, MLA and then MP, due to which he was able to work with various government departments, NGO’s and other organizations to make Borivali a The Suburb of Gardens, you will find a garden at every half a kilometer here with different themes.

There are various plantations theme in each garden, Gopinath Munde garden Largest collection of Palm trees is an example of Vertical garden in this collection of gardens/parks.^[6]

Blood Donation Drives

Gopal Shetty has always appealed people to donate blood at least once in a year and if more its better. He makes a point that functions in his constituency are marked Blood donation drive and his efforts over the years would have garnered donation of more than a 1 lakh blood bottle units.

Controversies

His remarks about farmer suicide created ruckus in media, later he clarified he was misquoted.

“Not all farmers’ suicides happen due to unemployment and starvation. A fashion is going on. A trend is on,” ^[7]

He was slammed by activist and opposition for his 'sexist' private member's bill in Lok Sabha.^[8]

He stoked a controversy by saying Christians did not participate in freedom movement.^[9] Allege corruption in utilization of open spaces.^[10]

References