Mumbai News Live (July 22): With daily Covid-19 cases in Mumbai hovering around 200 and hospital occupancy significantly reduced, the BMC is likely to take a call on dismantling the remaining jumbo Covid facilities in the city. At present, three jumbo facilities — BKC, Malad and Kanjurmarg — are functioning as exclusive Covid centres.
Meanwhile, Shiv Sena leader Aaditya Thackeray on Thursday held a gathering in Thane, the fief of Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, as part of his attempt to rally Sena cadre after the revolt by Shinde and a large section of party MLAs. This was his first major outreach programme outside Mumbai. He held meetings at Bhiwandi and Shahpur in Thane, where Shinde has a substantial support base. Calling the Shinde faction of Sena “traitors”, Aaditya said in Bhiwandi, “They are traitors and stabbed us in our back. Now also if you have even a little shame left, resign as MLAs and face elections.”
In other news, the Andheri police late Wednesday arrested a college dropout, who is alleged to have hacked WhatsApp accounts and sent obscene messages and videos to over 600 women. The man’s intention was to chat with the women and lure them to meet him, said police. Accused, Ravi Dandu (30), a resident of Dharavi, was arrested on Wednesday. He works as a data entry operator in a private bank.
A 42-year-old waiter was stabbed allegedly by a cook over food preparation in the kitchen of a hotel in Mumbai's Andheri area on Friday morning, a police official said.
The incident took place in Andheri East and the deceased has been identified as Jagdish Jalal, he said.(PTI)
A man died after being hit by a suburban local train at Kandivali station of the Western Railway, an official from the Government Railway Police (GRP) said on Friday.
A CCTV footage of the incident, which went viral on social media, shows the man walking to the edge of the platform and being hit by a local train as it enters the station.
The incident took place around 4.30 pm on Thursday on platform number 1-2 of the railway station, the official said.
The victim, who was in his mid to late 20s, was critically wounded, as one of his hands and his feet had been severed, he said, adding that the man died while undergoing treatment at a hospital.(PTI)
Three rebel Shiv Sena legislators on Friday alleged that then Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray had denied `Z plus' security cover to Eknath Shinde despite a threat from naxals.
But a Minister of State (MoS) for the home department in the Thackeray-led government denied the allegation.
Shinde, now Maharashtra chief minister, was `guardian minister' for the naxal-affected Gadchiroli in the Thackeray government besides being minister for Urban Development.
In February 2022, two months after 26 naxals were killed in police action in Gadchiroli, he had received a threatening letter, according to police.(PTI)
Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole on Friday said party leaders will visit rain-hit areas in various districts to take stock of damages and follow up with the state government about financial assistance to the affected persons.
Speaking to reporter here, Patole claimed that only two people were running the state government.
"The deputy chief minister is a minister without portfolio. The government does not exist and the administration is paralysed," the Congress leader said.
Accusing the state government of leaving the farmers in lurch, Patole cited that the Rabi season's produce has not been purchased and cultivators are yet to be paid for the produce that has been bought.(PTI)
A special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court in Mumbai on Friday rejected a plea seeking blanket anticipatory bail for all MPs and MLAs of the Maha Vikas Aghadi as "not maintainable", with the court also stating that such an order would set a "bad tradition".
The Maha Vikas Aghadi comprises the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena, the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party, and was in power in Maharashtra till June 29.
The petition, which was filed in June by Congress workers Madhu Holamagi, Yusuf Patel and Ranjeet Dutta, claimed the Centre was misusing probe agencies to target MVA constituents with the intention of supressing the (then) state government.
Though the court had sought a response from the Enforcement Directorate, the probe agency didn't appear or file a reply opposing the plea.(PTI)
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Friday told the Bombay High Court that it has extended till September the deadline given to shops and other establishments to put up signboards in Marathi Devanagari script.
A division bench, headed by Justice R D Dhanuka, was hearing a petition filed by the Indian Hotel and Restaurants Association challenging the validity of the earlier deadline of May 31 to change the language, font size and order of the language on signboards.
The BMC's advocate Dhruti Kapadia informed the court that the civic body has granted an extension and the deadline is now September 2022.
Advocate Vishal Thadani, who represents the petitioners, told the court that shops and establishments will comply with the directions within the extended time period.(PTI)
Bollywood actor Salman Khan on Friday met Mumbai Police Commissioner Vivek Phansalkar at the latter's office in south Mumbai, officials said.
The actor arrived at the Mumbai police headquarters, located opposite Crawford Market, in his car around 4 pm and met Phansalkar, an official said, adding that it was just a courtesy visit and had nothing to do with any case.
Khan also met Joint Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Vishwas Nangre Patil there.
Last month, Salman Khan and his father Salim Khan had received a letter threatening that the father-son duo would meet the fate of Punjabi singer Sidhu Moosewala, who was killed in May. After the letter, Khan's security had been enhanced(PTI)
The authorities of Taloja prison in Navi Mumbai have said they are yet to get money from the Maharashtra government to purchase more books for library as ordered by the Bombay High Court during a hearing of a bail plea filed by activist Anand Teltumbe.
Teltumbde, an accused in the Elgar Parishad Maoist links case, is currently lodged in Taloja jail.
The prison authorities had refused a book by British author P G Wodehouse to Teltumbde in April this year, and was then directed by the high court to spruce up the library of the prison.
Responding to a query filed under the Right to Information Act (RTI), the authorities have said the prison library currently has 2,998 books for over 3,000 inmates lodged in the facility.(PTI)
Seven men booked for killing 54-year-old chemist Umesh Kolhe, allegedly for a social media post supporting former BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma, who had made controversial comments against the Prophet in a TV debate were produced before special court for their remand hearing. The court remanded them to judicial custody till August 5. Earlier, on July 15, the court had extended their NIA custody till July 22.
The National High Speed Rail Corporation Limited has invited bids for the design and construction of an underground station at Mumbai's Bandra Kurla Complex and for a tunnel for the bullet train project, Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Friday.
This is the first set of bids invited after the rebel Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde-led government came to power in Maharashtra. The new government has given the green light to the project, which remained dormant during the erstwhile Uddhav Thackeray-led dispensation.
"Bids invited for design and construction of Mumbai underground station and tunnels for #BulletTrain," Vaishnaw said in a tweet.
While the minister's tweet indicated that there were multiple tunnels, the NHSRCL clarified that there is only one 467-metre cut and cover tunnel and a 66-metre ventilation shaft in the tender package. This shaft will also be used for taking out the tunnel boring machine (retrieval shaft).(PTI)
Bids invited for design and construction of Mumbai underground station and tunnels for #BulletTrain pic.twitter.com/CfRXveQy3l
The Mumbai Crime Branch has busted a racket where a Malad-based company lured people on Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms with advertisements of high-end mobile phones being sold at cheap rates, and sold them old and obsolete phones instead.
The police raided the company’s premises on Wednesday and arrested two people, including the owner, and said that the company, which even ran a customer care centre, had been operating for the last five years.
“The accused promised high-end phones and lured gullible people, who thought they were getting a phone worth Rs 10,000 or Rs 20,000 for less than Rs 5,000. Many people placed orders and received old phones in new boxes. The accused accepted cash on delivery but when the customers opened the boxes, they realised they were cheated,” Deputy Commissioner of Police (Detection 1) Sangramsinh Nishandar said. Read more
Maharashtra CM Eknath Shinde and Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis are scheduled to travel to Delhi this afternoon. The duo is likely to finalise cabinet expansion details. In the evening, the duo will attend the dinner organised by PM Narendra Modi in honour of the outgoing President Ram Nath Kovind.
Sources confirmed that around 30 ministers will be inducted in the first of the two-phase expansion. The state can have 43 ministers, including the CM. A highly-placed source in the government said Wednesday, “The Cabinet formation has been finalised by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and the swearing-in is set to take place on Friday.”
The Cabinet will have representation from both the BJP and the Sena’s Shinde faction. As per the decided formula, about two-thirds of the ministers will be from BJP, and the remaining from the Shinde camp.
Newly elected President Droupadi Murmu offers sweet to BJP National general secretary Vinod Tawde who went to greet her after the victory.
Tawde was in-charge of the Presidential poll, and toured extensively with Murmu to mobilise support across the country
Partly cloudy skies with light to moderate rains are likely in Mumbai and the suburbs today, according to the IMD forecast.
No heavy rains are expected in the city.
Headmasters of city schools run by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) are set to receive management training from the reputed Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies (JBIMS). A memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed between the two organisations on Thursday.
It is a programme of 40 sessions, each of 90-minutes. A total of 120 headmasters have been selected for the first two batches. It will be a three-month training programme to be held on the JBIMS campus in offline mode. On completion, an assessment and feedback will decide the future plan of action.
As part of this training, 25 modules have been designed which include topics such as instruction and leadership to engage the teams, development of managerial decision making skills in complex situations, and educational administration from a legal perspective (Gender/POCSO etc). Read more here
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s G/South ward office building on Elphinstone Road is set to register for a Green Building certification after being nearly equipped with all the requirements such as solar panel-powered electricity supply, a rainwater harvesting system, a sewage treatment plant and a waste segregation and composting unit in phase 1 of the revamp.
The revamp work in phase 1 has resulted in a 99.4 per cent decrease in the building’s electricity bill, from Rs 79,340 in May to Rs 433 in June; 100 per cent composting of wet waste, 100 per cent use of treated water from the in-house STP for flushing and gardening purposes. Read more
Opposing the re-development of the Bombay Development Directorate (BDD) chawls at Worli, Naigaon and NM Joshi Road in South Mumbai as planned by the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA), a group of architects, civil engineers and urban planners wrote to Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on Thursday proposing an alternative to the MHADA’s plan. The group, identifying itself as Consensus of Concerned Professionals, gathered 120 signatures from experts across disciplines for the letter.
The letter, a copy of which is with The Indian Express, reads, “There is no doubt that reconstruction is called for, to accommodate the same families in larger dwellings of not less than 28 sqm (300 sq ft), including a private toilet in each such dwelling. In the BDD chawls’ redevelopment, the MHADA has agreed to provide 45 sqm (500 sq ft).” Read more here
Five days after Chief Minister Eknath Shinde issued directions to address traffic-related issues on the Mumbai-Nashik highway, commuters continued to face a harrowing time on the stretch with vehicles stuck in endless queues on the stretch between Thane city and Kharegaon bridge.
Since July 3, commuters who would earlier navigate the stretch in 15-20 minutes are being forced to spend over two hours commuting on the same stretch.
While authorities have blamed the potholes that have cropped up on this section for the commuting woes, questions are being raised on why the state government has not been able to address the traffic problem which crops up every monsoon on this particular stretch which is the gateway for many vehicles that enter Mumbai from north Maharashtra and northern India. Read more here
Opposition Congress and NCP on Thursday avoided cross-voting in the Presidential election, numbers show.
Of the 283 votes polled in Maharashtra, 279 votes were declared valid. While the NDA bagged 181 votes, the UPA got 98 votes. Four votes were declared invalid. The numbers are likely to give a breather to Congress and NCP, as all their votes seem to have remained intact, avoiding cross-voting in favour of NDA candidate and President-elect Draupadi Murmu.
In all, 97 votes were polled from the two parties – 53 MLAs voted from NCP and 44 from Congress. The UPA has received one additional vote, likely of the lone MLA of CPI(M). Read more
The Bombay High Court on Thursday asked the Maharashtra government to make ‘positive and concrete efforts’ to create public awareness about the writings of Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar and other social reformers so that they reach more readers. The bench, while hearing a suo motu PIL regarding a stalled project to publish the writings and speeches of Dr Ambedkar also sought to know from the government the volumes being published and steps taken for the content which was not published yet; if there was damage to the copies and records, and how the same could be protected and preserved.
A division bench of Justice Prasanna B Varale and Justice Kishore C Sant said while the state government has published ‘wonderful’ volumes of original writings of several social reformers, efforts are not taken to make these books available to the common citizens in shops. “We are happy that the state published books on Rajarshi Shahu Maharaj and Mahatma Jotirao Phule but none knows about it,” Justice Varale said. Read more here
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has assured Consul General of Japan in Mumbai Fukahori Yasukata of fast-tracking infrastructure projects like bullet train, funded by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). Fadnavis gave the assurance on Wednesday during a meeting with Yasukata and other Japanese officials. The bullet train project is aimed at running the train between Ahmedabad and Mumbai on a high speed rail corridor at a speed of 320 kmph, covering a distance of 508 km and 12 stations.
Meanwhile, police arrested two persons in Thane in connection with the attack on a worker of the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena in Maharashtra, an official said. Harshawardhan Palande, deputy chief of the Sena's Kalyan city unit, was on Wednesday injured in the attack and admitted to hospital, said an official. The incident had taken place on Pune Link Road in Kalyan East. Four to five men had arrived in a car and attacked Palande with sticks, iron rods and choppers, a police official said.
In other news, Congress leaders from western Maharashtra held a protest in Pune against Enforcement Directorate summons issued to party chief Sonia Gandhi. Among those who took part in the protest outside the Collectorate here were senior leaders Prithviraj Chavan, Satej Patil, Praniti Shinde and Vishwajeet Kadam. "The BJP government is functioning as if they do not wish to follow the Constitution. They have taken a stand of finishing the opposition and we condemn such an act," former state minister Satej Patil said.