Pune man held for death threat to Sharad Pawar on Facebook

On Friday, Pawar, 82, allegedly received a message on Facebook that read “he (Pawar) will meet the same fate as (Narendra) Dabholkar soon”. Dabholkar, a civil activist, was murdered in Pune in 2013.

Mumbai: The Mumbai crime branch on Sunday arrested a suspect in Pune for allegedly issuing death threat to Sharad Pawar, chief of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), on Facebook. The accused, Sagar Barve, 35, was produced in court on Sunday and remanded in police custody till June 13 for further investigation.

HT Image

On Friday, Pawar, 82, allegedly received a message on Facebook that read “he (Pawar) will meet the same fate as (Narendra) Dabholkar soon”. Dabholkar, a civil activist, was murdered in Pune in 2013.

According to the police, Barve works in a prominent software company and his mobile phone has been seized. “We have not yet received technical details which are being gathered by the Cyber police. We will question Barve to know why he made the threat,” said a senior crime branch officer.

Pawar’s daughter Supriya Sule on Friday had alleged that her father had received a death threat on social media. Sule along with a delegation of NCP leaders met Vivek Phansalkar, Mumbai police commissioner, on Friday and a case was registered in LT Marg police station under section 506 (2) and 504 and 153 (A).

The case was transferred to unit 2 of the Mumbai crime branch.

The FIR was registered by a 53-year-old NCP worker and a south Mumbai resident, who alleged that the party worker attached with the IT cell sent him a viral social media post on his mobile number. The post was on Facebook with the account name of Rajkaran Maharashtracha, which contained the profile name of Narmadabai Patvardhan.

During investigation the Mumbai crime branch found that Barve was using the said Facebook account, said a senior crime branch officer.

However, there was another derogatory remark posted against Pawar on twitter under the profile name of Saurabh Pimpalkar from the Twitter handle ‘@SbhBJP’.

The officer said several police teams are working with the Cyber police and will soon arrest the other accused involved in the case.

However, Pawar on Friday said that he was not worried about the threat. Taking a dig at the Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis government in Maharashtra, he said that those responsible for law and order in the state cannot neglect their duties.