A massive morcha was taken out by members of Maharashtra Rajya Sanganak Parichalak Sanghatna over delay in meeting their demands by the State Government.
Nagpur: In a violent clash between the protestors and the police, around a dozen people, including a few policemen, were injured here on Wednesday, the Day-3 of of second week of Winter Session of Maharashtra Legislature. This is the first time the current Winter Session of Maharashtra Legislature being held in city witnessed violence. The past 7 or 8 days of Winter Session had witnessed dozens of morchas being taken out by different organizations to press for their demands.
The incident occurred when a massive morcha was taken out by members of Maharashtra Rajya Sanganak Parichalak Sanghatna over delay in meeting their demands by the State Government. When the police tried to stop the protesters at Tekdi Road from moving further Vidhan Sabha, they went berserk and pelted stones at the police. The pelting of stones forced cops to resort to lathi charge, lobbing of tear-gas shells and water canon to quell the violence. In the scuffle, at least 10-12 protesters injured. A few policemen too were injured in stone pelting.
According to reports, violence broke out near Tekdi Road when police tried to disperse the protesters. The members of protesting Maharashtra Rajya Sanganak Parichalak Sanghatna wanted to meet the Chief Minister to press their various demands including salary of Rs 15,000, Government recognition to their Sanghatana, all fringe benefits among other demands.
Yesterday (December 15) too, police had to resort to mild lathi charge as the morcha had turned violent. In order to control the surging crowd, the police retaliated with a mild cane-charge. However, the morchaites probably did not leave the spot and camped on Tekdi Road overnight. In the morning of Wednesday, the situation turned more violent when the protesters started pelting stones on posse of policemen deployed at the spot in anticipation.
Sources said that a few protesters were taken into custody by the cops and whisked away to an undisclosed destination.
Usually, a Morcha is stopped on one side of the road for better mob control. However, the Computer Operators turned violent and broke the barricades erected on the road dividers and went to the other side as well.
According to the protesters, from April 2011, on behalf of the Maharashtra Rajya Gramin Vikas Vibhag (Maharashtra State Rural Development Department) a programme called SANGRAM (Sanganikrut Gramin Maharashtra) Computerization of Rural Maharashtra was undertaken. For the implementation of the Computerization of Rural Maharashtra, Maha On-Line Company was selected. The Rural Development Department had selected this company. The Maha On-Line Company had appointed Computer Operators at Gram Panchayat, Panchayat Samiti and Zilla Parishad. These Computer Operators, they claimed that had worked with sincerity and honesty in the SANGRAM programme and made the Maharashtra State No-1 consistently for the last three years among all the e-panchayats in the country. The members who were participating in the Morcha alleged that they were being paid a meager amount per month. Depite several representations and agitations, the State Government failed to meet their genuine demands, lamented the protesters.
