Sena (UBT) leader threatens to blacken Rahul Gandhi's face over Savarkar remark
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Nashik (PTI): A local office-bearer of the Shiv Sena (UBT) on Wednesday said he would blacken Rahul Gandhi's face for his `derogatory' comments about freedom fighter Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, drawing a strong reaction from Congress leaders in Maharashtra.
The remark by Bala Darade, a deputy city unit chief of the Uddhav Thackeray-led party in Nashik, could put the opposition alliance Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) under strain.
"We are proud that we live in the birthplace of Swatantrya-veer Savarkar. Rahul Gandhi's statement about Savarkar, calling him 'Mafi-veer', was insulting. We condemn it strongly. We will blacken Rahul Gandhi's face if he comes to Nashik. If we can not do that, we will pelt stones at his convoy," Darade told a Marathi news channel on the occasion of the birth anniversary of the Hindutva ideologue.
The Sena (UBT) is an ally of the Congress in the MVA, and the two parties are also part of the INDIA grouping of the Opposition.
Nashik-resident Devendra Bhutada has filed a defamation case against Gandhi, claiming that some remarks made by the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha against Savarkar hurt his feelings.
Darade further said he did not care about the consequences of his threat for the MVA. "We will not tolerate anyone using abusive language against Savarkar....Whatever be the future of Maha Vikas Aghadi, we will not tolerate insult to Savarkar," he said.
Sena (UBT) spokesperson Sushma Andhare told reporters that Darade's views were his own and and not the official stand of the Uddhav Thackeray-led party.
Maharashtra Congress president Harshwardhan Sapkal termed Darade's threat as "cowardly."
''Rahul Gandhi's father late Rajiv Gandhi and grandmother late Indira Gandhi sacrificed their lives for India's unity. Congress and its leadership are not afraid of such threats," he told reporters.
Rahul Gandhi did not make derogatory remarks against Savarkar, he said, adding, ''His comments contain historical references. Even (journalist and writer) Arun Shourie, a minister in the Vajpayee government, has written a book on Savarkar, and most references in that book are what Rahul Gandhi has said. Our workers are capable of tackling such threats,'' Sapkal said.
Yashomati Thakur, another Congress leader and former state minister, said her party believes in non-violence but is capable of responding to threats. "Rahul Gandhi only repeated what has been written in history,'' she said.
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MP cruise boat tragedy: Search ops expanded to trace four missing passengers
Jabalpur (PTI): Army divers and disaster response teams on Saturday expanded their search at Bargi Dam in Madhya Pradesh to locate a man and three children still missing after the cruise boat tragedy that claimed nine lives two days ago, officials said.
With 28 of the 41 identified passengers onboard the ill-fated cruise boat rescued safely, police are preparing to register an FIR in connection with the accident that occurred at the reservoir in Jabalpur district on Thursday evening, they said.
The search radius has been expanded to 5 km in the backwaters of the Bargi Dam, located downstream of the Narmada River, area sub-divisional officer of police (SDOP) Anjul Ayank Mishra told PTI.
Nine people drowned in the incident, while 28 were rescued, and efforts are ongoing to trace the missing persons, he said.
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According to the police, more than 200 rescuers, including around 20 Army divers airlifted from Agra, began the search operation at 5 am on Saturday to trace Kamraj, an employee of the Ordnance Factory in Khamaria, his son Tamil (5), Vijay Soni (6) and Mayuram (5).
Mishra said that an inquest case has been registered and the post-mortem of nine deceased persons has been completed.
"Our priority is to search for the missing persons. We will soon register an FIR," he said.
Investigators have said that CCTV footage near the boarding point showed 43 people heading towards the ill-fated boat, and the names of 41 persons, who boarded the vessel, have been ascertained so far.
Collector Raghvendra Singh confirmed that a search is underway for four missing persons.
The rescue operation, being carried out by the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) and local divers, was briefly affected around 9 am due to strong winds.
The state government on Friday ordered a probe into the incident and dismissed three crew members after survivors alleged negligence and safety lapses, including failure to provide life jackets.
The government also banned the operation of similar vessels in the state.
The boat, operated by the state tourism department, sank during a sudden storm around 6 pm on Thursday, and the wreckage was retrieved from the dam water on Friday, after the rescuers confirmed that there were no more bodies inside.
Eyewitnesses have said that strong winds made the water choppy, prompting passengers to raise an alarm and ask the crew to steer the vessel towards the riverbank.
A survivor alleged negligence by the crew and described a last-minute scramble for life jackets.
