In new trouble for Amaravati MP Navneet Rana and her husband MLA Ravi Rana, arrested in the Hanuman Chalisa controversy, the Maharashtra government will challenge the bail granted to the couple. Special Public Prosecutor Pradeep Gharat said the state government would approach the court to cancel the bail granted to Rana.
Gharat said the couple had violated the bail conditions and hence the state government would challenge it. He further said that the Ranas had made statements which amounted to contempt of court which resulted in violation of bail conditions. The special court to hear cases against MPs and MLAs had put several conditions while granting them bail, one of which was that they would not talk to the media about the matter.
Gharat said that the petition for cancellation of bail will be presented in the sessions court on Monday. Navneet and Ravi Rana walked out of jail a day after they were granted bail on May 4.
Sources said the Rana family will visit Delhi on Monday and inform the Home Ministry about the sedition charge. They will also discuss the “politics of vendetta” through action by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation and “misbehaviour” while in jail.
After coming out of jail on May 5, Ravi Rana had alleged that his wife Navneet Rana complained of health problems and requested for hospitalisation. The MP’s lawyer had also told the media that she was unwell, had high blood pressure, body ache and spondylitis.
The couple was arrested on April 23 under sections 124A (sedition) and 153A (promoting enmity between different groups) of the Indian Penal Code. The Ranas had announced that they would recite Hanuman Chalisa outside ‘Matoshree’, the private residence of Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, which angered Shiv Sena workers. Both later dropped the plan citing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Mumbai.
But the police, nonetheless, booked him for sedition and “promoting enmity between different groups”, among other crimes.
(with PTI inputs)
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