Mumbai: The Thane police commissioner has informed the Bombay high court that a DCP-level officer would conduct an inquiry against the Thane municipal commissioner in the case where a Right to Information (RTI) activist was allegedly threatened. The court then directed the police commissioner to submit the probe report within three weeks.
A division bench of Justice Abhay Oka and Justice Riyaz Chagala was hearing a petition filed by Pradip Patil wherein he alleged that there is scam in road concretisation in the jurisdiction of the Thane Municipal Corporation. He claimed that due to substandard work, potholes had appeared on the roads, affecting vehicular traffic. He further alleged that there are 21 roads whose works don’t fit into the prescribed rules of the corporation. Mr Patil also claimed that he had made several representations before the appropriate authorities but no one took cognisance of him.
Earlier, Mr Patil informed the court that Thane commissioner Sanjeev Jaiswal had called him and threatened him because he had filed a petition. He claimed that he registered an FIR against Mr Jaiswal but the police and corporation administration said that he had never visited the commissioner’s bunglow.
On Tuesday, the Thane police submitted an application seeking further investigation on the allegations made by the activist. The court was irked and said that the state government’s investigation officer had given a clean chit to municipal commissioner yet today they wanted to carry out further investigation. “So how he had given a clean chit to commissioner earlier,” the court asked. The court then said, “We have lost faith in the investigation officer: and asked the Thane police commissioner to look into this investigation and take an appropriate decision.
