BJP leads tally of lockdown breaches during protests with 40% offences

Nagpur: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), taking seriously their duty as key opposition party in Maharashtra, repeatedly hit the streets in violation of Covid norms during the lockdown, leading to maximum number of offences against them since March 22, 2020. Out of the total 307, around 40% were registered against the BJP for various agitations, followed by 11% against Congress workers.
While BJP topped the table with 124 cases against their activists, Congress party workers and leaders had 35 cases against them, followed by Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) 15 and eight against Shiv Sainiks. Though police could not take much coercive action against the violators due to weak laws, it has already sent charge sheet in 134 cases to the court, while 173 cases are still being probed.
The leaders of different political parties had, without police permission, thronged the streets to champion various causes, in violation of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) 144 and other special laws like Epidemic Act and Disaster Management Act. The protests ranged from BJP’s relentless agitation against power bill hikes, recovery and tariff controversy, to the Congress’ protest against central government over petrol and diesel price rise, and NCP’s agitation against Mahametro, and the demand for action against Munna Yadav, and in Eknath Nimgade murder case., and so on.
Despite being in power in the state and a partner of Congress and NCP’s Mahavikas Aghadi, Shiv Sena too launched stir violating restrictive orders.
BJP state spokesperson panellist Chandan Goswami said they had to launch stirs in the interest of the people when government did not keep its promises. “We had to protest as government had started strict recovery of power tariff in inhuman manner and were also snapping supplies. We maintained guidelines of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) during most agitations and also took along only a few activists, but still police were ruthless in booking us as we are in the opposition,” he said.
City police chief Amitesh Kumar said cops were impartial in registering offences against violation of prohibitory orders. “We can vouch for the fact that not a single agitation was spared from offences, irrespective of the party or banner and their causes,” said Kumar.
Kumar also refused to admit there was no fear of the law. “Every case goes through a certain procedure in the criminal justice system, which takes it’s own course till a logical conclusion,” he said.
Congress state spokesperson Atul Londhe said their party had to agitate over vaccine policy and other issues including unemployment and price rise. “Offences were registered against even Mahatma Gandhi for protest,” he said.
NCP corporator Duneshwar Pethe said his party mostly followed democratic and constitutional framework during protests.
Shiv Sena city president Nitin Tiwari too said offences were political in nature and registered only for their action to help the masses.
PROTESTS GALORE
· Maximum 124 cases filed against BJP during lockdown
· Congress party faced 35 offences
· NCP had 15 cases against them, Shiv Sena had eight
· Total 307 cases registered, 134 cases already charge sheeted