MUMBAI: Asking why deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis was afraid of being arrested in the phone tapping case, the Shiv Sena (UBT) in an editorial in Saamna, the party mouthpiece, said that the phone-tapping case that took place under Fadnavis as CM is more serious than the one raging in Rajasthan currently.
"Devendra Fadnavis is constantly claiming that he was going to be arrested.
If you listen to his old speeches, he said, we put our hands in the jaws of a tiger and count its teeth. Then why was a person with such courage afraid of arrest? Basically no one was going to arrest Fadnavis. He was the leader of the opposition in the state. Can anyone arrest the opposition leader? In fact, we have never done such dirty deeds in two and a half years," Raut said.
"Currently, a phone-tapping case is raging in Rajasthan. The Gehlot government is facing allegations of tapping the phone of its own MLAs. This phone tapping is being investigated by the central agencies. The Chief Minister's OSD has been summoned in the case. But Gehlot is not crying foul and alleging that there is a conspiracy to arrest him.
Maharashtra phone-tapping is more serious than the Rajasthan one. In Maharashtra's case, senior police officers were threatening MLAs and asking them to support Fadnavis. Police officers were keeping track of the movement of the MLAs and keeping a close eye on them," the editorial said.
The Sena also asked what happened to these cases in which Fadnavis was going to be arrested? The editorial asked if Fadnavis had anything to do with that case and stated that if Fadnavis had disclosed this, then there would be no confusion.
The Sena also hit out at the promotion given to IPS officer Rashmi Shukla. "After his government came to power, it withdrew cases against Shukla regarding the tapping of phones of opposition leaders. And now the government has promoted her... From INS Vikrant mega-scam to phone-tapping of opposition leaders, all cases have been withdrawn," the editorial stated.