Irate railway services aspirants set a train on fire at a railway station near Patna to protest against Raj Thackeray.
After spending a night in a police lock-up in Kalyan, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray was given bail in the cases registered against him for attacks on North Indian railway job aspirants.
<b1>Thackeray’s anticipatory bail is valid for two days, after which he
may be arrested again by any other police station that names him in related cases. There are over 20 cases filed across Maharashtra for the violence against North Indians. Thackeray, though, was named in only two cases. He has now got bail in both.
A weary Thackeray returned to his Shivaji Park home amidst celebrations.
Once again, reverberations of the attacks on North Indians were felt elsewhere in the country. There was violence at several areas in Bihar. Protesters torched six bogies of different trains at Barh, Athmalgola and Sasaram, vandalised railway property and disrupted services on the Howrah-Delhi main line via Patna and Grandcord line via Gaya. Nearly 20 were stranded in the Danapur railway division. Police had to open fire at Sasaram; two protesters were injured.
The Maharashtra government has kept up the pressure on Thackeray. “Till this agitation by the MNS is completely uprooted, the state government’s stance will remain tough. Is destroying property, burning and defacing things navnirman (redevelopment)?” said Deputy Chief Minister RR Patil.
(With inputs from Ashok Mishra in Patna and Satya Prakash in New Delhi)