Mumbai Chief minister Eknath Shinde has taken a serious note of the attack on former minister and rebel MLA Uday Samant’s car in Pune and has directed the state police chief on Wednesday to ramp up security of the MLAs in his camp.
The matter was discussed in the state cabinet meeting held at Sahyadri guest house on Wednesday. “CM Shinde in Marathi said in the cabinet meeting that take the bull by the horns (Angarvar aale tar shingevar ghya),” said a senior official under conditions of anonymity.
Shinde then directed the director general of police to increase security of the rebel MLAs. Currently, many of the rebel MLAs enjoy ‘Y plus’ security cover by the police. When asked, DGP Rajnish Seth said, “I cannot discuss the security details of MLAs.”
Six people including Shiv Sena city unit chief Sanjay More were arrested by the Pune police hours after the attack on Samant. A case has been registered against 15 persons at Bharti Vidyapeeth Police station under section 307 of Indian Penal Code (IPC). The prosecution on Wednesday told the Pune court that Tuesday’s attack was the fallout of political malice and differences among the two groups.
Police Inspector Sangeeta Yadav, an investigating officer, while seeking the custodial remand of the suspects, listed six reasons including possible involvement of more people in the attack and use of hockey sticks and stones in the incident.
“The crime was committed out of political enmity and differences and there is great possibility of involvement of more persons. For this, prosecution needs custody of suspects,” she said in the court.
Public prosecutor further said that the accused used hockey sticks to commit crime, and police want to investigate and seize all these weapons as proof.
However, defence lawyer Vijaysingh Thombre claimed that the accused were arrested under false charges. “Video of the attack on the vehicle of MLA Uday Samant is circulated on social media, and no one from the accused could be seen in that video. Only because the accused are Shiv Sena workers and office bearers, false cases have been registered against them under political pressure,” he said.
One of the persons arrested is Shiv Sena leader Baban Thorat, who is the party’s sampark pramukh (contact chief) of Hingoli district of Marathwada region.
A video surfaced on social media in which Thorat was seen inciting party workers to vandalise vehicles of leaders from rival Eknath Shinde camp. Those who would do it would be felicitated by Uddhav Thackeray, Throat apparently said in the video.