In which case were you fearing arrest? Sena camp asks Dy CM

Uddhav Balasaheb

Thackeray faction pulls up Fadnavis for ‘blatant

First India Bureau Mumbai: The Shiv Sena - Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray on Wednesday took a dim view of Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis’s claim that the previous Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government had tried to put him in jail. It asked the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader in which case he was

“fearing” arrest. An editorial in the party mouthpiece Saamana claimed that IPS officers had threatened MVA legislators to support Fadnavis and spied on them by tapping their phones.

Fadnavis should explain if such “illegal” phone tapping is a crime or not, it said.

Fadnavis recently said the MVA government

Investigations

had given a target to then Mumbai Police Commissioner Sanjay Pandey to jail him, but the officer failed as he had done nothing wrong.

Reacting to it, the Saamana editorial on Wednesday asked, “Why was Fadnavis scared that he may be arrested? In which case was he fearing arrest?...Fadnavis should have clarified,” it said.

“In the last few days, Fadnavis has been speaking blatant lies,” it claimed, adding this is not the “sanskar” of the (Rashtriya Swayamsevak) Sangh.

The daily said the MVA had filed cases against IPS officer Rashmi Shukla in connection with the alleged phone tapping. The phones of MVA leaders were illegally tapped when Fad- navis was the chief minister, it said. The phone numbers of MVA leaders were tapped under different names said to be of drug peddlers and terrorists, it claimed.

The investigating officers in the case visited Fadnavis when he was the leader of opposition and took his statement respectfully. There was no need to make an issue out of it, Saamana said.