FIR lodged against Thackeray for remarks against Bihar natives

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An FIR has been lodged against MNS chief Raj Thackeray allegedly for promoting enmity, causing mischief and making statements prejudicial to the national interest by making remarks branding Bihar natives as infiltrators in Mumbai, the Delhi Police told a court here.

Thackeray, who had allegedly threatened to throw Bihar natives out of the state, has been booked under section 153 A (promoting enmity between different groups on ground of place of birth etc), 153 B (making imputations prejudicial to the national interest) and 505 (making statements conducing to public mischief) of the Indian Penal Code.

The Delhi police submitted the copy of the FIR to the court of Metropolitan Magistrate Neeraj Gaur, who on September 27 had directed it to lodge an FIR against Thackeray.

The court's order and the FIR pertain to a complaint by advocate Prem Shankar Sharma, who had said Thackeray's August 31 remarks, terming Bihar natives as infiltrators and threatening to throw them out of Maharashtra, are provocative and anti-national, for which an FIR must be lodged against him.

The police had earlier in its action-taken-report over the complaint, told the court that it was facing several legal hurdles in lodging the FIR against the MNS chief as neither the comments were made in the national Capital nor the newspapers which carried them are printed here.

It had said neither the MNS office is situated in the jurisdiction of Subzi Mandi police station here nor any such statement has been made by Thackeray in a place under the jurisdiction of the police station.

The police had also said "the news causing hurt to the complainant has been printed in Noida and Sahibabad, Uttar Pradesh. Hence, the complaint has been forwarded to SSP Ghaziabad for necessary action at their end."

Sharma had said in his complaint that "Thackeray's August 31 remarks that Bihar natives who have been living in Maharashtra, especially in Mumbai, shall be kicked out of the state, were defaming and his provocative statement is against national integration as the Indian Constitution has given all citizens the right to live anywhere in the country."

The MNS chief had allegedly made the remarks reacting to a media report that Bihar chief secretary Navin Kumar wrote to Mumbai police commissioner voicing displeasure over the arrest of a youth from Bihar for vandalising the martyr's memorial during the Azad Maidan protest on August 11 in Mumbai.