Describing Mayawati as a "living goddess", the ruling BSP in Uttar Pradesh, facing a hail of criticism over the garland issue, says it will continue to weigh her party supremo with gold and silver.

The party will continue to felicitate her with currency garlands, UP BSP head Swami Prasad Maurya told a convention of Panchayati Raj department employees here yesterday.

Launching a counter-offensive against the Opposition which lambasted the BSP on the garland episode, he said nobody asks for any explanation when crores of rupees are being offered in temples across the country.

"Why should the party give an account of the money being giving to its living goddess when unaccounted money is being donated in temples," Maurya said.

"On the contrary, if BSP workers collect money from their own incomes and offer it to their living goddess, it does not go well with Manuvadis in media and politics," he said.

The BSP workers will continue to weigh their "goddess" with silver and gold and offer garlands made of curreny notes, the party leader said.

"As the Opposition parties have been wiped out in UP, these cannot digest a dalit's daughter wearing a garland," he said.