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Police have not probed what has been done with funds collected by BJP leader Kirit Somaiya and his son to save the decommissioned naval aircraft carrier Vikrant, a Mumbai court has held while disposing of the closure report in a cheating case against the duo. Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (Esplanade court), S P Shinde, in an order passed last week, directed the police to conduct further investigation in the case, saying it was necessary, and submit a report. Commissioned in 1961, INS Vikrant, a Majestic-class aircraft carrier of the Indian Navy, played a key role in enforcing the naval blockade of East Pakistan during the Indo-Pakistan War of 1971. It was decommissioned in 1997. In January 2014, the ship was sold through an online auction and scrapped in November that year. The case against Somaiyas was registered at the Trombay police station here in April 2022 based on a complaint lodged by an ex-serviceman, who claimed he donated Rs 2,000 in 2013 for the campaign. The ..
BJP leader Kirit Somaiya on Friday claimed that the Government Railway Police (GRP) had granted permission in 2021 for four more illegal hoardings in Mumbai to the advertising firm involved in the Ghatkopar billboard collapse. Somaiya said these hoardings have been installed at the Railway Police Colony near Tilak Bridge, Dadar. Four more hoardings illegal permission was given by GRP Railway Police of Maharashtra Govt to Bhavesh Bhinde EGO Media in 2021 (sic), Somaiya said in a post on X. Bhavesh Bhinde, director of M/s Ego Media Pvt. Ltd., which had put up the giant hoarding that collapsed in suburban Ghatkopar killing 16 people and injuring 75 was nabbed from Rajasthan and brought to the city early on Friday. The illegal 125 feet x 125 feet hoarding, which stood on a piece of land in possession of the GRP, crashed onto a petrol pump in the Chheda Nagar area on Monday evening when the city was hit by dust storms and unseasonal rains. Ex-MP Somaiya had alleged on Thursday that no
Rajya Sabha MP and Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut has sent a legal notice to BJP leader Kirit Somaiya for alleged defamatory remarks made while Raut was in jail. Raut is an accused in a case pertaining to alleged financial irregularities in connection with the redevelopment of Patra Chawl tenement in suburban Goregaon. He was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in July last year for his alleged role in the case. He is currently out on bail. The notice, sent through his lawyers Sandeep Singh and Supriya Kadam, asked Somaiya to apologise. If he failed to do so, Raut will proceed with criminal and civil defamation cases against him, it said. Referring to the BJP leader's tweets, posted while Raut was in jail, the notice said, "You had made several false and baseless complaints against my client and every complaint circulated on your Twitter account is completely false, frivolous, unwarranted, without application of mind and without any information and proof.
Maharashtra BJP leader Kirit Somaiya on Thursday met new Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and thanked him for replacing a "mafia CM", a reference to his predecessor Uddhav Thackeray. Thackeray, who is also the Shiv Sena president, resigned as CM late last month following a revolt in the legislative wing of his party led by Shinde. "Met 'Rikshawala' CM @mieknathshinde at Mantralaya today alongwith @NeilSomaiya , expressed Best Wishes & Thanked him for replacing MAFIA CM," Somaiya tweeted. The former Lok Sabha MP from Mumbai met Shinde at Mantralaya (state secretariat) in south Mumbai after the latter officially assumed charge of his new post. His government is being supported by the BJP. Shinde briefly worked as an auto-rickshaw driver in Thane before making it big in politics.
Former chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on Tuesday slammed the Maharashtra government for issuing a show-cause notice to BJP leader Kirit Somaiya for accessing some official documents. Somaiya visited Mantralaya, the state secretariat, on Monday to review some government documents in accordance with the provisions of the Right to Information Act, Fadnavis claimed. "But this brainless government has mowed down the democracy and issued a notice to Somaiya...Has the government lost its (mental) balance completely ? The person who ordered the officials to issue a notice to Somaiya should face some action, Fadnavis added. The BJP leader also said that it was because of activist Anna Hazare's "relentless pressure", the Right To Information Act, 2005 was framed. If the government is not aware of these processes, it should first get proper information, he said.