EVEN AS the verbal duel between Union MoS for Civil Aviation Murlidhar Mohol and Shiv Sena leader Ravindra Dhangekar escalated and the Jain community members gheraoed him Saturday, Mohol assured the protestors that by November 1, the issue will end. “This issue will end by November 1. You will get the result you want,” Mohol told the protesting Jain community members.
Mohol made the announcement after he met Jain Muni Acharya Shri Guptinandji Maharaj in Pune on Saturday. Soon after he met the Jain Muni, angry Jain community members gheraoed him and demanded the sale deed of Jain Boarding House be cancelled. “I have given the word to the Gurudev. 100 per cent this matter will end,” he said.
Mohol added, “I have been repeatedly saying that I am not involved in this matter. Every community has a religious seer. They are respected by one and all. Today, I came to seek his blessings. If I were guilty, I would not have come here. I have told him that the matter will end very soon. I am sure, there will be proper justice in this matter.”
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Meanwhile, Dhangekar continued his attack on Saturday as well. As soon as Mohol called on the Jain Muni on Saturday, Dhangekar wasted no time in taking a jibe. He then tweeted: ”Either save Jain temple or save your ministerial post.” This was what the seniors in the party told Mohol yesterday. And today, he quickly rushed to seek blessings of the Jain Muni. He remembered the Jain seer as many as 18 days after the community highlighted its plight. When the fence has eaten the crop, who will ensure justice?”
“Mohol has ensured that his company benefits from the deal. Now he is finding it difficult to cancel the deal. Hope he will soon return the land of Jain community which he has grabbed,” Dhangekar said. Dhangekar said he has also written to the Prime Minister, seeking cancellation of the deal. “I will launch a sit in agitation from October 27 till the deal is cancelled,” he said
Meanwhile, the AAP has urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to order a “thorough and impartial probe” into the Jain Trust property transaction. In a letter to the Prime Minister sent on Saturday, AAP state vice-president Vijay Kumbhar, who is also a social activist, also demanded an investigation into the roles of Gokhale Landmarks LLP, two cooperative credit societies, and all officials involved. “We urge the PM to institute a probe into the alleged irregularities in the Jain trust property transactions in Pune…”
Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.
Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives.
Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees.
During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa.
Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died.
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