Nagpur: A Shiv Sena leader and his supporter assaulted a senior National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) officer at Mouda and have gone underground. Sources in the NTPC said that former zilla parishad (ZP) member Devendra Godbole and his close aide Hitendra Gorle had assaulted Rajkumar Prajapati, senior manager (HR) and verbally abused public relations officer SK Lal outside the office of sub-divisional officer (SDO), Mouda, on Monday. Ramtek MP Krupal Tumane, who is also from Sena, was sitting inside the SDO’s chamber at that time.
Mouda police have registered an offence against Godbole under sections 309 and 324 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The two Senamen had sought anticipatory bail from lower court but were not successful. NTPC sources claimed Godbole is hiding in the house of a relative in Nagpur.
NTPC officials said that Godbole wanted a contract of transporting NTPC material through trucks. When officials refused to rig the tender in his favour, he decided to teach them a lesson.
Tumane had asked the SDO to convene a meeting of NTPC officials in his office. “The Sena workers were trying to provoke us to lose our cool. However, they were unsuccessful. When Prajapati and Lal came out of the office after the meeting, they were assaulted by Godbole and Gorle,” said an official.
The official charged that Mouda police treated Godbole with kids gloves. “Some 50 offences are registered against Godbole since 1995 but police have not arrested him even once. This is the reason he dared to assault our employees,” he said.
Another NTPC official charged that Sena leader had deliberately convened the meeting in the SDO’s office so that they could assault the staffers. “Our power plant is protected by Central Industrial Security Force (CISF). Had our officials been assaulted inside the plant, the CISF would have arrested and handed them over to the police. However, as Godbole knew that Mouda police would not arrest him, he asked Tumane to hold the meeting outside the plant,” he added.
