Thane NCP leader, activists booked for raising slogans against Maha CM Shinde

An offence has been registered against the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Anand Paranjpe and others for allegedly raising slogans against Chief Minister Eknath Shinde during a protest in Maharashtra’s Thane city, police said on Friday.

Paranjpe, the NCP’s Thane city unit chief, and more than 20 party activists staged a protest and raised slogans against the chief minister outside the party’s office in the city on Thursday evening, an official said. A functionary of the Shiv Sena’s Shinde faction approached the police with a complaint after seeing a video of the protest on social media, he said.

An offence under sections 153 (wantonly giving provocation with intent to cause riot), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) and other relevant provisions of the Indian Penal Code and Maharashtra Police Act has been registered at Chitalsar Police station, while no arrest has been made so far, the official said.

Apart from this, two more offences have been registered against the protestors at two police stations in the city based on different complaints, it was stated. A complaint has also been lodged by a Sena functionary belonging to the Shinde faction against the NCP leader and activists in Kalyan, police said.

Meanwhile, NCP leader and former minister Jitendra Awhad in a tweet accused the state government of behaving like a gangster and said that the opponents were bound to oppose and this was expected in democracy.