Sitting amid the blackened remains of his home, 32-year-old Nikesh Gawali carefully broke open a half-melted plastic box with a screwdriver. His hands shook slightly, not out of fear, but out of hope. “I’m trying to find my daughter Aarti’s gold earrings,” he said quietly, still focused on the box. “She’s just five. I got them made recently after months of labour work.” The plastic box, warped and blackened by heat, was one of the few things left from his two-room house on the outskirts of Dhamangaon village . All around him lay ash, broken tin sheets and charred wooden beams. The walls had cracked under the heat and the front room’s tin roof had caved in completely. What remained was a blackened debris all around - almost nothing to suggest a home once stood there. Nikesh earns his living as an agricultural labourer, like many in the village. Work is uncertain and depends on the season. Those earrings weren’t just jewellery - they were a small dream, a reward for his hard work,...
Tehsildar’s report exposes dubious role of cops CM directs Collector to probe this serious issue By Dheeraj Fartode When there is growing demand to either close down or shift liquor shop or bars from residential localities, a classic example of how a favourable report was prepared by police tweaking the facts and manipulating statements of nearby residents and a non-existent women’s organisations has come to fore. These discrepancies have been highlighted by a senior officer like Tehsildar of Hingna tehsil in his report submitted to the District Collector exposing misdemeanor of some personnel of MIDC police. It was on the basis of this questionable NoC granted by MIDC police, the permission to open liquor shop in dense residential locality of Gajanan Nagar, Nildoh in Hingna tehsil just outside the municipal limits of Nagpur city was granted. Overlooking the opposition of residents, the police report attached statements of “neighbours” either...