After a local court in Raigad district granted bail to Union Minister Narayan Rane over his remarks against Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, the BJP’s Maharashtra unit president Chandrakant Patil on August 25 said that the court’s decision was akin to a slap on the face of Mr. Thackeray’s Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government, which operated solely on the strength of strongmen and by misusing the police machinery.
Mr. Patil further remarked that the MVA government’s prosecution of Mr. Rane was solely motivated by political vendetta and public support for him would be even more overwhelming in the Konkan region during the remainder of the Minister’s ‘Jan Ashirwad Yatra’.
“This [the court’s bail order] is victory of truth… Mr. Rane has emerged unscathed from the clutches of the police...henceforth, even if he doesn’t speak a single word during the rest of his Yatra, his silence will be just as powerful and his presence just as commanding. People will turn out in even greater numbers to see their beloved leader,” asserted Mr. Patil.
Lashing out at the tripartite MVA government, the State BJP chief said that for the last 20 months since its formation, it had only been taking one beating after another on every matter.
“This is a government predicated only on the power of hooligans and thriving with the abuse of the police machinery,” Mr. Patil said, while warning the Thackeray government to withdraw an order imposed under Section 144 of CrPC in some areas of the Konkan.
Rane’s remarks heat up political environment across Maharashtra
Mr. Rane, the newly minted Union Minister of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, and Mr. Thackeray’s bête noire , had stirred a hornet’s nest on August 23 when he said he would have given Mr. Thackeray a tight slap for allegedly forgetting the number of years of India’s Independence during a speech on August 15.
His remarks triggered a wave of anger among Sena activists, who pelted stones on BJP offices in Nashik, Pune and Mumbai and clashed with BJP cadre in Mumbai and elsewhere.
No less than five FIRs were filed against the Union Minister in Nashik, Pune, Mahad and parts of Mumbai, with the Nashik Police Commissioner issuing a warrant for Mr. Rane’s arrest.
This led to a high-voltage drama in Ratnagiri district, with Mr. Rane’s party colleagues Prasad Lad and Pramod Jathar, and his sons – Nitesh and Nilesh – stridently decrying the ‘foul’ actions of the Thackeray government and indulging in heated altercations with the Sangameshwar police who went to take the Minister in custody.
The drama finally culminated in a court hearing close to midnight in Mahad, Raigad, where Mr. Rane was brought. Hundreds of his supporters crowded outside the courtroom amid massive police deployment.
After a tense hearing, the Mahad court granted the Union Minister bail on conditions of furnishing a bail bond of ₹15,000, not tampering with prosecution evidence, not inducing or threatening anyone to tamper with the evidence, cooperating with the police machinery and promising not to repeat the same offence again.
