The Maharashtra police on Monday arrested BJP leader and former Maharashtra Minister Anil Bonde along with a other party members in connection with rioting in Amravati last week.
Authorities said they are also on the lookout for BJP MLC from Amravati Praveen Pote, who is apparently ‘missing’ since the violence and vandalism of November 13.
Maharashtra Minority Development Minister and senior Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Nawab Malik accused the BJP of hatching a “pre-planned conspiracy” to foment rioting across Maharashtra.
More than 70 persons have been arrested thus far and more than 25 FIRs registered at four police stations in Amravati in connection with the violence and vandalism that occurred on November 12 and 13. Officials said Mr. Bonde — the State Agriculture Minister under the erstwhile BJP regime — and Mr. Pote were instrumental among others in calling for and organising the BJP’s shutdown on November 13.
Stressing that there had been no ‘communal clashes’ in Amravati district, Mr. Malik alleged that Mr. Bonde had ‘conspired’ to start riots by distributing money and liquor to miscreants.
“The BJP had called for a bandh on Saturday… it was a pre-planned conspiracy to ensure that the riots spread across Maharashtra but the State’s public ensured that it never spilled outside Amravati city. It is also emerging now that a large sum of money for the purpose of spreading the riots was transferred from Mumbai to Amravati… but the police had the situation well under control when the violence started there,” said the NCP leader.
Mr. Malik further denied news reports that an FIR had been lodged against an NCP corporator in Malegaon, which had witnessed tensions on November 12.
“The concerned person against whom the FIR has been lodged is Mufti Mohammad Ismail Abdul Khalique…while he was formerly with the NCP, he joined the AIMIM after 2019,” Mr. Malik said.
Lashing out at the BJP, he said when the saffron party had run out of all weapons to destabilise governments in opposition-ruled States, it use riots as a weapon of last resort.
“But Maharashtra’s public is well aware of the BJP’s designs and will bever accept this ‘politics of conspiracy’…The BJP should understand that by merely throwing money, they can never root out the Maharashtra [ruling tripartite MVA] government nor by misusing central agencies. This kind of negative politics will never take root in Maharashtra… our government runs on the principles of Chhatrapati Shivaji and does not bow before the unjust diktats of the Centre in Delhi,” Mr. Malik said.
On November 12, violence had erupted out in at least three cities in the State — Amravati, Malegaon (in Nashik district) and Nanded — after some minority organisations had reportedly called for a day-long shutdown to protest against incidents of mosques being vandalised in Tripura.
A ‘counter-bandh’ was called by the BJP in Amravati as a challenge on November 13. According to authorities, hundreds of people, many of them holding saffron flags and raising slogans, had come out on the streets which resulted in violence and damage to property belonging to minority community members, with the police compelled to lathi charge the protestors.
Earlier on Sunday, Home Minister Dilip Walse-Patil had said the situation in Amravati district and other parts of Maharashtra was well under control and that the motive behind the rallies called by certain organizations which led to violence and a heightening of communal tensions in some cities of the State would be probed.
The Minister further said that no casualties have been reported from Amravati thus far where a three-day curfew has been imposed and Internet services suspended.
Published - November 15, 2021 06:11 pm IST
