Congress MLA 'bathes' Maharashtra engineer in slime

Sindhudurg, July 4 (IANS) Irked over the poor condition of the Mumbai-Goa highway, Congress legislator Nitesh Rane and his supporters vented their ire on a road sub-engineer by bathing him with wet mud and slime, and even attempted to tie him to a bridge here on Thursday. Rane, accompanied by Kankavli Municipal Council President and activists of the NDA-affiliated Maharashtra Swabhiman Party (MSP) had gone to inspect road repairs being carried out on a stretch of the bridge on the Gad River near Kankavli. They accosted the sub-engineer, Prakash Shedekar, questioning him on the bad condition of the roads and protested how the people had to battle slime and mud daily, and the potholed roads routinely. "People are bearing it daily... Now, you also experience it..." they said and threw a couple of buckets full of slime on Shedekar, roughed him up and pushed him around. They demanded to know "who has given you the right to sink Kankavli under slime" and some activists took him around in the wet mud to show him the ground reality. At one point, Rane and other activists were seen attempting to tie Shedekar to the under-construction bridge, ostensibly to teach him a lesson. Videos of the incident went viral on social media evoking mixed reactions, with many condemning the incident. Rane is the son of MSP President and former Chief Minister Narayan Rane.
--IANS qn/mag/bg