Padmakar Valvi’s wife Yogita has arrived in Mumbai to ‘rescue’ her husband who has been accused of defecting from the Congress to the Sena-BJP combine.Valvi has dismissed suggestions that he is being forcibly held by the Opposition, but Yogita says he’s prisoner at Matoshree Club, which has turned into a Sena-BJP bastion amidst the political crisis. Yogita, now residing at the house of Swaroopsinh Naik (Congress Minister for Environment and Forests), says, ‘‘They will harm him, please rescue him.’’Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh said Valvi disappeared after an emergency meeting of Congress legislators when he left for the MLA hostel to freshen up. Later, Valvi said he had switched sides of his own free will.NCP president Sharad Pawar claimed Valvi had written a letter to the Governor saying he was being forcibly detained. Valvi refuted this too. Yogita has met Governor Dr P.C. Alexander along with the CM. Valvi has declared his wife is being pressurised into making statements by parties with vested interests. On Saturday night, Sena-BJP leaders even turned the police away, refusing to allow him to be taken away from the club.Valvi’s wife has now decided to file a habeas corpus in Bombay High Court seeking her husband’s release from the custody of Sena-BJP leaders. Yogita, who had a one-and-half-hour conversation with Joint Commissioner of Police (Administration) Sanjeev Dayal, says she has requested Governor Alexander to meet her husband alone at some other location.DCP Jai Jeet Singh, who visited Matoshree Sports Club following the Governor’s direction to Police Commissioner M.N. Singh, failed to take the legislator out of the club as Opposition leaders Narayan Rane and Gopinath Munde stopped him.Special secretary to the Governor, V.K. Jairath, said the Governor did not want to intervene in the process of the law if the case was one of abduction. ‘‘The Governor’s role was limited to the letter submitted by Valvi’s wife,’’he said.
