Independent MP Navneet Kaur Rana and her husband MLA Ravi Rana at Parliament
Hanuman Chalisa row: Arrested MP Navneet Rana and her MLA husband will stay in jail as a Mumbai Sessions court on Thursday deferred the hearing on their bail pleas till tomorrow. The hearing was deferred after the Rana couple’s lawyer Ponda sought time till tomorrow.
Special public prosecutor Pradeep Gharat, however, opposed the date saying that he cannot come to the court tomorrow due to another case in the Alibag town of Raigad district.
Navneet Rana and Ravi Rana were arrested on April 23 following their public declaration of reciting the Hanuman Chalisa outside Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray’s private residence ‘Matoshree’ in Bandra. The Ranas eventually dropped their plan but were arrested under various sections of the IPC including those related to sedition and promoting enmity between different groups.
A Bandra magistrate court had remanded them to 14-day judicial custody on Sunday.
In the first FIR, Ranas were booked under Sections 34, 153A (Promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony) of the IPC and Sections 37(1) and 135 of the Bombay Police Act. Section 124A (sedition) was added later.
While Navneet is lodged in Byculla women’s prison, Ravi, who is MLA from Badnera in Amravati district, is in Taloja jail in neighboring Navi Mumbai.
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