A court in Thane has sent two people accused of assaulting former pro vice chancellor (VC) of the University of Mumbai (MU) Ashok Pradhan to police custody of three days.
Accused arrested, produced before court
The accused were arrested on Tuesday night and produced before the court. While the police had initially booked them under the charges of trespassing with the intention of assault, unlawful assembly and rioting, it later added more stringent sections of Indian Penal Code including those pertaining to the attempt to murder, dacoity and criminal intimidation to its First Information Report (FIR).
The attack on VC
Pradhan, who also served as VC of Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University, was allegedly attacked on Sunday by a few people at his residence in Kalyan. According to the police, one of the accused was terminated as a lecturer at a private education institute with which Pradhan is involved. He had visited Pradhan in the hope of getting reinstated. However, the conversation turned into an argument and led to the assault.
The new sections were added to FIR after several social activists demanded stricter action against the alleged offenders. Manav Sahayak Seva Mandal, a Kalyan-based non-government organisation submitted a letter to the police and the district administration for this purpose.
