5 MLAs suspended from House for thrashing cop

No Arrests Yet, Tough Laws Not Invoked

Sharad Vyas & S Ahmed Ali TNN

Mumbai: The state assembly on Wednesday suspended five MLAs involved in Tuesday’s attack on a traffic policeman for the rest of the year even as police tried in vain through the day to arrest some of them.
    Police teams fanned out to pick up MLAs Kshitij Thakur (BVA) and Ram Kadam (MNS) and even came to the assembly but returned empty-handed amid talks between senior police officials and
the state and assembly administration and talk of their surrender on Thursday.
    The suspended MLAs are Kadam, Thakur, Pradeep Jaiswal (Ind), Rajan Salvi (SS) and Jaykumar Rawal (BJP). They cannot take part in assembly proceedings till December 31 and are barred from entering the Vidhan Bhavan in Mumbai and Nagpur.But going by past experience, the suspension may not hold. In 2009, four MNS MLAs were suspended for 4 years for slapping SP’s Abu Azmi. But the term was commuted in July 2010.
    Late at night, the cop, Sachin Suryavanshi, was shifted to Bombay Hospital after reportedly complaining of chest pain. CRIME, BUT NO PUNISHMENT? WHAT HAPPENED On Tuesday, a group of 15 MLAs punched and kicked traffic police sub-inspector Sachin Suryavanshi inside the assembly. The legislators were irked with the cop for having stopped and fined Nalasopara MLA Kshitij Thakur for speeding and sporting dark film on his car on the Bandra-Worli Sea Link
THE 5 MLAS SUSPENDED Kshitij Thakur (33), Bahujan Vikas Aghadi, Nalasopara
Ram Kadam (41) MNS, Ghatkopar (West)
Jaykumar Rawal (38) BJP, Sindkheda
Rajan Salvi (49) Shiv Sena, Rajapur
Pradeep Jaiswal (52) Independent backed by Sena, Aurangabad Central DOUBLE STANDARDS? More than 30 hours after the attack, the MLAs concerned were not even summoned for questioning. The police chief said there had been no offer from the MLAs to surrender
The Law For An Ordinary Citizen If you assault a cop, beat him up or even have a heated argument, chances are you will be booked immediately and arrested for obstructing a government employee from performing his duty. If police fail to arrest you on the spot, you can be picked up from anywhere later
Special Provisions For An MLA If a legislator is accused of assaulting a public servant or a citizen, police will first “scrutinize” allegations and verify if he was present at the spot. He will then be called to give his statement, which will also be verified. Only if the allegations are found true by an inquiry will he be arrested. However, the Speaker has to be informed within 24 hours Non-bailable charge not in FIR against MLAs
Mumbai: A team of the crime branch, which is following up on the FIR against 15 MLAs for the assault on a traffic policeman, collected CCTV footage from five cameras on the assembly premises. “We have just got the CCTV footage and are trying to identify people (involved in the assault) besides MLAs Ram Kadam and Kshitij Thakur,” said joint commissioner Himanshu Roy.
    A top officer said though various IPC sections like causing grievous hurt and wrongful assembly have been applied on the MLAs, cops have not included the tougher and nonbailable section 332—voluntarily causing hurt to deter a public servant from his duty.
    In the House, a resolution for suspension was moved by parliamentary affairs minister Harshvardhan Patil and adopted by voice vote. “Their action has lowered the dignity of the august House and for it, the Vidhan Sabha expresses regret,” Patil said, adding that Sachin Suryavanshi was beaten up when he visited room 114 around 12.50pm during a breach of privilege hearing over an altercation he had with MLA Thakur near the Bandra Worli Sea Link last week.
    Outside, as police teams sought to arrest the MLAs, it was learned that Mumbai police commissioner Satyapal Singh, speaker Dilip Walse-Patil and CM Prithviraj Chavan had hammered out a formula whereby Thakur and Kadam would surrender on Thursday morning. In the evening, Singh denied it. “There is no question of the MLAs offering to surrender. My teams are hunting for them but as of now, we have not made any arrest,” he said.
    Sources said two teams of senior police officers had gone to Vidhan Bhavan and another team was sent to Virar to arrest Thakur. But they were unsuccessful. Kadam and Thakur’s cell phones were switched off, and there were reports that they would file for anticipatory bail on Thursday.
    The sources said the case against Kadam and Thakur was strongest as in the FIR Suryavanshi has said that Kadam first slapped him and tried to strangle him while threatening that “wherever you go, I will kill you”. Thakur joined Kadam and kicked him in his groin and threatened him.
    The IPS officer’s association on Wednesday met to condemn the attack, but seemed to have been mollified by the government action. “We were told appropriate action has been taken. The government has stated in the House that they have suspended the MLAs...,” said secretary P K Jain.
    However, the suspension angered the opposition, which claimed Congress-NCP legislators had been spared. “We had advocated strict action against our own MLAs... but it’s unfair that the Congress-NCP spared its own MLAs who had threatened to stall budget proceedings if subjected to the embarrassment,” said MNS leader in the house Bala Nandgaonkar.