Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said there was no dearth of funds for development of Bhiwandi town in the district.

Addressing a meeting after inaugurating the Rs. 62 crore Vanzarpati Naka flyover, Fadnavis called upon citizens to take “ownership” and help development of the power-loom town.

However, senior Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde, who is PWD minister and Thane’s Guardian Minister was conspicuous by his absence in the programme.

Fadnavis also laid foundation stone for the Rs. 125 crore Rajiv Gandhi-Saibaba flyover in Bhiwandi.

The Chief Minister said a city that has proper infrastructure but if it is not clean, neat and hygienic then it cannot be considered as a good city.

“There is no death of funds for development of Bhiwandi. The state government will do all possible things for the (development) of the city,” he assured.

“You (citizens) should not simply depend on the state government and the civic corporation, but you should have a sense of ownership, then only the town will improve” he said.

Taking a dig at the Congress and NCP, the Chief Minister said it was observed that the previous government had not paid much attention to the needs of the non-urban towns.

“We have decided to extend a helping hand to them (such towns) but at the same time we also need something in return from you (citizens), that you should help in keeping the city clean,” he added.

He reiterated his earlier observation that most of the rivers were polluted not on account of industrial waste but due to domestic waste water which was around 90 per cent.

“There should be reduction in generation of domestic waste water. The three areas which need to be attended to in any city are provision of potable drinking water, waste water treatment and its disposal and garbage disposal” he said.
Fadnavis said that the proposed water supply project

of 100 MLDs for the town costing around Rs. 568 crore suggested by the Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development Authority (MMRDA) and civic body, would receive due attention.

“We will try for viability gap funding from the Centre,” he said.

The Chief Minister also announced funds worth Rs. 10 crore for road works apart from Rs. 25 crore for improvement of Meenatai Thackery auditorium, underground water drainage and road concretisation work.

Bhiwandi MP Kapil Patil, MLAs Kisan Kathore, Ganpat Gaikwad, MMRDA Commissioner UPS Madan and District Collector Ashwini Joshi were present on the occasion.

Other Shiv Sena leaders from the district “boycotted” the function.

The Bombay High Court has upheld the conviction and life sentence imposed on a 27-year-old man for murdering a 79-year-old German woman in 2005 in Pune’s upmarket Koregaon Park.

A division bench headed by Acting Chief Justice V K Tahilramani while dismissing an appeal filed by Iqlak Fakir Mohammad Shaikh challenging the lower court’s order convicting him, held that the prosecution has proved beyond reasonable doubt the case against him.

The prosecution case was that the victim Dr Gudrun was seen last by her neighbours and friends on December 31, 2005.

On January 2, 2006 when the victim’s maid went to her house nobody responded. On January 6 the neighbours used a spare key to enter the flat and found the victim’s headless body.

According to the prosecution, a television and some silver items were missing from the victim’s home. On the basis of a cheque of a bank account of Shaikh apparently dropped during a scuffle with the victim and found near her body, the police arrested him. The stolen things were recovered from him.

The HC after perusing the evidence and facts of the case observed that there is ample and conclusive evidence to prove the guilt of the convict beyond reasonable doubt.

“This is a case of brutal murder of an old German lady of 79 years, who was residing all alone in the flat. The case of the prosecution is based on the circumstantial evidence alone and at the outset itself, we are constrained to observe that the circumstances proved on record by the prosecution in the present case are so strong and forbidding, forming a chain so complete that no other inference but of the guilt of the appellant can be drawn from the proved circumstances on record,” the court said.

Tata Housing has tied up with another realtor Neptune group to develop a housing project in Mumbai at an estimated cost of Rs. 200 crore.

The company, which is the real estate arm of the Tata group, today announced expansion in the premium real estate space with the launch of new project ‘Eleve’ in Mumbai, in collaboration with Neptune Group.

The starting price of the flat in this project, spread over 22 acres, is Rs. 1.4 crore, Tata Housing said in a statement.

Land parcel belongs to Neptune Group and both the partners would develop 500 units in this project at an investment of Rs. 200 crore, sources said.

Commenting on the occasion, Brotin Banerjee, MD & CEO, Tata Housing, said: “We are extremely glad to partner with Neptune to expand our presence in Mumbai.”

Nayan Bheda, CMD, Neptune Group said this project is poised to benefit immensely from the vast experience of Tata Housing in creating landmark developments across the country and Neptune’s strong brand presence locally in Bhandup.

Established in 1984, Tata Housing is a closely held public limited company and a subsidiary of Tata Sons. It is developing 70 million sq ft under various stages of planning and execution and an additional 19 million sq ft is in the pipeline.

The Bombay High Court has reunited a Hindu-Muslim couple from Rajasthan, after the woman was taken away by her parents and forcibly married-off to another man later.

Rajasthan Police produced the woman on November 23 before a bench of justices Ranjit More and Shalini Phansalkar-Joshi on a Habeas Corpus petition filed by her husband (to whom the woman got married earlier).

The woman from the minority community fell in love with a Hindu man and they eloped from their village in Rajasthan.

They went to Ujjain in Madhya Pradesh where they got married on June 8 this year, as per Hindu rites.

However, the woman’s relatives took her away to her parents’ house on the pretext that she would be brought back to her matrimonial home in Madhya Pradesh. Later, she was forced to marry another man in Gujarat.

Meanwhile, the man (to whom she was married earlier) moved to Mumbai and filed a police complaint at Ambarnath town in nearby Thane district stating that his wife, who was pregnant with his child, was missing. He urged the police to trace her and bring her back.

As police could not find the woman, the husband filed a Habeas Corpus petition in the High Court urging that police may be asked to find her.

The petitioner told the High Court that he received a telephone call from his wife saying that she was kept in wrongful confinement at a place in Rajasthan.

The HC directed the Rajasthan police to visit the woman’s house and produce her before it. Accordingly, she was produced before the bench on November 23.

The judges asked the woman whether she wished to go back to her parents or stay with her husband who had filed the Habeas Corpus petition. To this, she replied that her choice would be to join her husband in Mumbai to whom she was married earlier.

The bench then ordered that the couple be reunited and allowed them to stay together.

There is no end to twists and turns in the high-profile Sheena Bora murder case and a letter was allegedly sent to her landlord in July 2012, three months after she was murdered. CNN-IBN has accessed the letter bearing Sheena’s forged signature which had sought cancelling her rent agreement.

The Central Bureau of Investigation in its chargesheet details how Indrani Mukherjea instructed her assistant to allegedly forge Sheena’s signature on the letter.

The e-mail reads, “On several occasions we received threat from Indrani, which we have taken seriously, and therefore I have protected myself and Sheena by documenting this situation, with dates, events, history, conversations and messages included. These have been given to several third parties for safekeeping. Should anything happen to either Sheena or me authorities in both India and UK will be made aware.”

Another e-mail accessed was sent from Sheena’s account to Vidhie nine months after she was murdered.

Investigators believe that the e-mail was sent by Indrani, impersonating Sheena to keep up the charade that she was alive and in the US.

Emails were also exchanged between Sheena and her mother Indrani just days before she was murdered in April 2012. In these e-mails, Sheena informed Indrani that she has applied to universities in the UK and could be in the country in August or September for her Masters if she is accepted.

In the chargesheet, the CBI said that Indrani’s response to Sheena’s emails just before the murder are positive and Indrani was attempting to gain Sheena’s confidence and lure her into meeting her as she did on April 24, 2012 (date of Sheena’s murder).