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By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

YouTuber challenges FIR, LoC in HC

Mumbai : The Bombay High Court issued notice to the state government on a petition filed by UK-based medico and YouTuber, Dr. Sangram Patil, seeking to quash a Mumbai Police FIR and revoking a Look Out Circular in a criminal case lodged against him, on Thursday.   Justice Ashwin D. Bhobe, who heard the matter with preliminary submissions from both sides, sought a response from the state government and posted the matter for Feb. 4.   Maharashtra Advocate-General Milind Sathe informed the court...

YouTuber challenges FIR, LoC in HC

Mumbai : The Bombay High Court issued notice to the state government on a petition filed by UK-based medico and YouTuber, Dr. Sangram Patil, seeking to quash a Mumbai Police FIR and revoking a Look Out Circular in a criminal case lodged against him, on Thursday.   Justice Ashwin D. Bhobe, who heard the matter with preliminary submissions from both sides, sought a response from the state government and posted the matter for Feb. 4.   Maharashtra Advocate-General Milind Sathe informed the court that the state would file its reply within a week in the matter.   Indian-origin Dr. Patil, hailing from Jalgaon, is facing a criminal case here for posting allegedly objectionable content involving Bharatiya Janata Party leaders on social media.   After his posts on a FB page, ‘Shehar Vikas Aghadi’, a Mumbai BJP media cell functionary lodged a criminal complaint following which the NM Joshi Marg Police registered a FIR (Dec. 18, 2025) and subsequently issued a LoC against Dr. Patil, restricting his travels.   The complainant Nikhil Bhamre filed the complaint in December 2025, contending that Dr. Patil on Dec. 14 posted offensive content intended to spread ‘disinformation and falsehoods’ about the BJP and its leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi.   Among others, the police invoked BNSS Sec. 353(2) that attracts a 3-year jail term for publishing or circulating statements or rumours through electronic media with intent to promote enmity or hatred between communities.   Based on the FIR, Dr. Patil was detained and questioned for 15 hours when he arrived with his wife from London at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (Jan. 10), and again prevented from returning to Manchester, UK on Jan. 19 in view of the ongoing investigations.   On Wednesday (Jan. 21) Dr. Patil recorded his statement before the Mumbai Police and now he has moved the high court. Besides seeking quashing of the FIR and the LoC, he has sought removal of his name from the database imposing restrictions on his international travels.   Through his Senior Advocate Sudeep Pasbola, the medico has sought interim relief in the form of a stay on further probe by Crime Branch-III and coercive action, restraint on filing any charge-sheet during the pendency of the petition and permission to go back to the UK.   Pasbola submitted to the court that Dr. Patil had voluntarily travelled from the UK to India and was unaware of the FIR when he landed here. Sathe argued that Patil had appeared in connection with other posts and was not fully cooperating with the investigators.

Shifting Projects Reduces Votes

Updated: Oct 30, 2024

BJP

In the span of two months, Maharashtra has lost out on two huge projects to Gujarat. The shifting of the project was an effort by the Shinde-Bharatiya Janata Party government to ensure the victory of the BJP in the Gujarat Assembly polls. In all the state has lost total investments projected at Rs 2.25 lakh crore which could have generated over two lakh jobs. The Opposition in Maharashtra came down heavily on Eknath Shinde-led government for losing out the multi-crore Tata-Airbus project and Vedanta-Foxconn semiconductor manufacturing project to the neighbouring poll-bound state of Gujarat.


Instead of competing hard, the Eknath Shinde-led government allowed, within four months of taking oath in 2022, four major projects to slip out of the state. Coincidentally, all preferred Gujarat. These include the Tata Airbus manufacturing plant and Vedanta-Foxconn plant besides two others, totalling a staggering Rs 1.80 lakh crore investment and lakhs of jobs. Therefore, the state’s overall capacity was questioned. Due to which electric vehicle manufacturing, AI-driven industries, integrated data centre parks, agri and food processing units, has been met with scepticism. Without a plan and aggressive canvassing the Shinde government proceeded. Even Mumbai’s status as the commercial and financial capital of India is under a shadow. Already, the finance sector has shown a preference, natural or politically nudged, towards the Gujarat International Finance Tec-City, or GIFT City, near Ahmedabad with eight of the 10 biggest Indian asset managers by assets having relocated their business there or set up new funds in GIFT City, according to a recent report. With the GIFT City assiduously promoted by the Modi-led union government as a gateway for global capital and financial services, and Mumbai’s status as a diamond trading centre challenged by the 800-hectare Surat’s Diamond Research and Mercantile City, Mumbai needs to pull up its socks. However, hardly any efforts are seen. The Shinde -Fadnavis government preferred to tow the line of Delhi bosses.


The state government, in turn, has pinned the blame on the previous Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government, alleging that kickbacks and corruption on part of the MVA government were the root cause of the project slipping out of Maharashtra. But even as the ugly war of words continues in Maharashtra politics, it turns out that Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways and Nitin Gadkari had written a letter to the Tata Sons chairman, making a case for why the company should expand its various businesses in Nagpur-Maharashtra and how the company could make good use of the excellent infrastructure facilities created in the region. The letter written by Nitin Gadkari emphasised how the state had created a special economic zone (SEZ) in MIHAN (Multi-Modal International Hub Airport at Nagpur). Gadkari had advocated how land, manpower, and warehousing could favour the Tata Group.


But what caused these slippages?

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