Hanuman Chalisa row: Mumbai police move court seeking cancellation of Rana couple's bail
Mumbai(PTI): The Mumbai police on Monday filed an application in a special court here seeking cancellation of the bail granted to independent MP Navneet Rana and her MLA-husband Ravi Rana, accused in a sedition case following a row over the recitation of Hanuman Chalisa.
The police sought that the couple's bail be cancelled on the ground that they had allegedly violated one of the conditions imposed by the special court while granting them bail last week.
Navneet Rana, the Lok Sabha member from Amravati in Maharashtra, and her husband Ravi Rana, the legislator from Badnera in Amravati, were arrested by the Mumbai police on April 23 after they announced that they would recite the Hanuman Chalisa outside Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray's private residence 'Matoshree' in Bandra area here.
They were booked on charges of sedition and prompting enmity between different groups.
The special court had on May 4 granted bail to the couple and imposed some conditions on them, including not to indulge in a similar offence and not to speak to the media.
On Monday, the suburban Khar police filed an application through special public prosecutor Pradip Gharat, seeking that the court cancel the couple's bail as they had allegedly violated the condition of not speaking to the media.
The accused persons (Navneet Rana and Ravi Rana) have given interviews to media since their release and hence, flouted the condition imposed by the special court while granting them bail. We are seeking for the bail to be cancelled and a warrant to be issued to the accused and they be taken in custody forthwith, Gharat said.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
