Pune dance bars stay open for now

Two dance bars on the outskirts of Pune will remain open for now. Pune SP Bhujangrao Shinde said the bars — Love Bird and Golden Dream ...

Two dance bars on the outskirts of Pune will remain open for now. Pune SP Bhujangrao Shinde said the bars — Love Bird and Golden Dream — have obtained stay orders from the high court, in an earlier case, to remain open. But these will also be closed down once the government orders are issued, he said.

Pune itself does not have any dance bars. Three bars opened near Wadgaon Maval in August 2001. The bars were closed down within a month after a hue and cry over their corrupting influence on the youth. But the owners obtained a stay from the high court in 2003 and reopened. Recently, Deepa shut shop.

Meanwhile, in central Mumbai, some unidentified persons today pelted stones at Discovery bar on Kurla Road, Sion. They fled before the police reached the spot.

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Over 1,000 dancing bars in Mumbai would down their shutters from Thursday midnight to protest the government’s decision to close the bars in rest of the state.

‘‘The government cannot fool us,’’ the president of Bar Association of Mumbai Manjit Sethi said, adding, ‘‘they want to sow a rift between us and break our unity through such disparity.’’ He also said the state Home Minister would be gheraoed by bar girls unless the decision was revoked.

In Nagpur, the city police refused to renew the licences of two dance bars. ‘‘We have served show cause notices for violating the conditions to two dance bars one month back which were returnable today,’’ City Police Commissioner S.P.S. Yadav said, adding that the owners could not explain why they were not allowing customers with families to visit their bars.

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