MNS workers ransack refinery’s Mumbai office

The growing opposition to the proposed Nanar oil refinery and petroleum products complex took a violent turn on Monday, as the MNS activists vandalise the office of Ratnagiri Refinery and Petrochemicals Limited at Tardeo in south Mumbai.

A day after MNS chief Raj Thackeray threatened that his party would take to streets if the Centre and Maharashtra Government tried to go ahead with the Nanar project, a group of his party workers barged into the Ratnagiri Refinery and Petrochemicals Limited’s office and went on a rampage, after heaping abuses on the security guards present there.

A video footage of the incident showed that after forcing themselves inside the refinery office, the MNS activists confirmed from the security guards present that they had come to the right address and went on to ransack the furniture, fittings, glass doors, cabins and other things inside the office.

The attempts by the security guards to prevent them from going on a rampage proved to be futile.

The video also showed that the MNS activists raising anti-Nanar projects slogans before leaving the place. Before long, the video went viral on social media.

The Raj Thackeray-led MNS is the latest to join the political bandwagon that is opposing India’s largest oil refinery and petroleum products complex that is coming up at Nanar in Ratnagiri district in coastal Konkan region.

Apart from assuring a delegation of Nanar residents that met him at his Krishna Kunj residence at Dadar in north-central Mumbai, the MNS chief had on Sunday hit out at chief minister Devendra Fadnavis for threatening that in the event of the oil refinery not happening in Maharashtra, the Centre would the project to Gujarat. 

“Why only Gujarat? Why not Goa or Kerala or Tamil Nadu or any other State in India? What is the reason for this?” Raj had demanded.

“As far as the MNS is concerned, come what may we will not let the oil refinery project to come up at Nanar,” Raj had said, while addressing a public meeting at Mulund in north-east Mumbai on Sunday evening.

Simultaneously, in an editorial published in its official mouth-piece “Saamana”, the ruling Shiv Sena earlier in the morning slammed the Chief Minister for holding out threats that the refinery project would be moved to Gujarat if it was not allowed to come up at Nanar in coastal Konkan region.

“Instead of holding out threats of the Centre moving the refinery project from Nanar to Gujarat, why cannot it be shifted to some parts of Maharashtra like Vidarbha or Marathwada where it can generate employment for at least  1 lakh people.

If that happens, even the chief minister will be happy that the project would boost his Rs Magnetic Maharashtra’ project,” the Saamana editorial stated.

The Sena reiterated that it was opposed to Nanar project as it would destroy ecological system of coastal Konkan region which is known natural beauty.

The Shiv Sena had registered its first protest against the Nanar project on April 12, a day after an Indian consortium comprising Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Saudi Arabian Oil Co (Saudi Aramco) for setting an oil refinery and petroleum products complex at Nanar in Rajapur taluka of Ratnagiri district.