AGENCIES / Mumbai

Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar today claimed that former chief minister Devendra Fadnavis’s government in Maharashtra had misused police machinery in the Elgar Parishad case.

He said that the Elgar Parishad case and the case of violence at Koregaon-Bhima in Pune district on January 1, 2018, were two completely different cases.

Talking to media here, Pawar said the Fadnavis-led BJP government and the Pune Police “misused” their power in Elgar Parishad case.

He demanded that an SIT be appointed to probe the conduct of Pune police and the misuse of power by the Fadnavis-led government.

The Centre transferred the case from the state to the National Investigation Agency (NIA) fearing that the truth would be out, Pawar said.

The activists in the Elgar Parishad case could be termed as aggressive but not anti-nationals, he said.

The violence at Koregaon-Bhima was the result of a “different atmosphere” created by Hindutva actvists Milind Ekbote and Sambhaji Bhide, he said.

Cases were also registered by Pune police against those who were neither involved with Elgar Parishad nor the Koregaon-Bhima violence, he said.

The matter relates to alleged inflammatory speeches delivered at the Elgar Parishad conclave, held at Shaniwarwada in Pune on December 31, 2017, which the police claimed, triggered violence near the Koregaon-Bhima war memorial in the district the next day.