On Kirit Somaiya attack row, Mumbai top cop writes to CISF chief

Four people including Shiv Sena leader and former city mayor Vishwanath Mahadeshwar have already been arrested in connection with the attack on Somaiya, whose car was pelted with stones on Saturday at the Khar police station.

MUMBAI: Mumbai Police commissioner Sanjay Pandey has requested Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) director general to investigate what the security personnel assigned to Bharatiya Janata Party leader Kirit Somaiya were doing when the former Lok Sabha member was attacked last week, people familiar with the matter said.

BJP leader and former Lok Sabha MP Kirit Somaiya (Twitter/KiritSomaiya)

A senior Mumbai police confirmed that Pandey has written to the CISF director general to look into the role of the security personnel when Somaiya was allegedly attacked by Shiv Sena workers outside Khar police station. Somaiya had gone to the police station to meet Amravati MP Navneet Rana and her husband, MLA Ravi Rana, who were arrested for inciting enmity by insisting on reciting Hanuman Chalisa outside chief minister Uddhav Thackrey’s Bandra residence, Matroshree.

Four people including Shiv Sena leader and former city mayor Vishwanath Mahadeshwar have already been arrested in connection with the attack on Somaiya, whose car was pelted with stones on Saturday at the Khar police station.

The CISF has not reacted to the Mumbai top police officer’s letter yet.

On Monday, Somaiya led a delegation of BJP lawmakers from Maharashtra to apprise minister of state (MoS)-Home Nityanand Rai and Union home secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla about the attack on him and the ‘deteriorating’ law and order situation in the state,

In February this year, Somaiya asked the Centre to review his security because, according to him, he has become a target of the Shiv Sena-led coalition government in Maharashtra.