After BJP MLA's 'batting', Cong MLA's 'mud attack'

NEW DELHI: Congress MLA Nitesh Rane was caught on camera attacking a government official with mud and slime on a highway near Mumbai on Thursday in a brazen display of political arrogance. Pummeled on social media, Nitesh Rane later drove to the police station and turned himself in.

He was arrested along with two others.

Nitesh Rane, the son of veteran politician and former chief minister Narayan Rane, had gone with supporters to "inspect" road repairs on a stretch of the Mumbai-Goa highway when he targeted an engineer, Prakash Shedekar, over the poor condition of the road.

He lashed out at the official, alleging that people had to suffer muddy and potholed roads routinely because of his incompetence.

"People are suffering it daily... Now, you also experience it," the lawmaker and his lackeys reportedly said, tipping buckets full of slime on Shedekar, manhandling him and even tying him up.

"Now do you get it," Nitesh Rane says, questioning the mud-covered official aggressively. "Who has given you the right to sink this area under slime?"

At one point, the Congress lawmaker and his men are seen trying to tie Shedekar to the railing of the half-built bridge on which the incident took place, apparently to "teach him a lesson".

Videos of the incident have drawn disgust and condemnation on social media.

In another development, BJP legislator Akash Vijayvargiya, who thrashed a civic body official last week in Indore, has been issued a show-cause notice Thursday by his party's disciplinary committee. This comes days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's strict criticism on the first-time legislator's shocking action.

The PM had said "such people" should be expelled from the party without exception, "no matter whose son". Lawmakers of the ruling BJP then held a session with Modi that sources said included a chat on Akash Vijayvargiya's widely criticised assault. Akash Vijayvargiya, 34, is the son of senior BJP leader Kailash Vijayvargiya.