Mumbai, Maharashtra
The Shiv Sena has objected to closing the criminal case against two Palghar womenwho were arrested for lamenting in a Facebook post the shutdown on the day of Sena chief Bal Thackeray's funeral. On Wednesday, Bhushan Sankhe, president of the Palghar Sena unit, submitted a plea before first-class judicial magistrate V S Yadhav saying the court should take cognizance of the women's "offence" and issue them a summons.

On November 18, Shaheen Dhada, 21, had uploaded the post, which was 'liked' by Rinu Shrinivasan, 21. Sankhe filed a complaint against Dhada, while Sainiks also asked her to apologize. Despite Dhada apologizing, a hospital run by her uncle was damaged the same day. The next day the Palghar police arrested Dhada and Shrinivasan for promoting enmity between groups and sending a grossly offensive message through a communication device. The girls were given 15 days' judicial custody and bail of Rs 15,000 each. Their arrests kicked off a nationwide debate on freedom of expression.

On November 20, after a public outcry, police finally arrested 10 men for attacking the hospital. A report submitted by special inspector-general (Konkan) Sukhwinder Singh on November 23 said the women's arrests were unjustified. On November 26-27, two senior policemen were suspended for the girls' arrests and a third cop was given a warning. Separately, the Palghar magistrate was transferred.

On December 18, Boisar sub-divisional police officer Vijaykant Sagar filed a C-summary report (case is neither true nor false) in court to close the case against the two women. On December 22, the court issued a notice to Sankhe to reply. Sankhe was to file his reply by January 7, but sought time till January 11 on the grounds that all papers were not given to him by the police.

On Wednesday, Sankhe told the court that the state had acted in haste due to pressure from the Centre. He said the print and electronic media had "portrayed exaggerated versions of the incident". Therefore, he said, "the state acted against the policemen under political pressure". He alleged that Dhada had deliberately made provocative and false statements on Facebook. He said her "FB statement had affected lovers, admirers and staunch followers of Bal Thackeray". He said "thousands of people were agitating before the Palghar police station to take legal action against the women". Seeing the riot-like situation, the police rightly lodged an FIR against the girls.

The court asked the state to file a reply by January 18.