Latur MLA alleges "harassment" by Assembly cops

Mumbai: Congress MLA from Latur, Vaijnath Shinde, Thursday staged a protest against the alleged "high-handed" attitude of policemen on security duty at the Assembly premises here.

"I had reached the main gate of Assembly and was passing through, when policemen on duty stopped me and behaved rudely with me," Shinde, who refused to budge from the venue, told reporters. "This is not the way to treat a legislator. In the last three years I have never misused my privileges as an MLA to sidestep entry procedures," said Shinde, a supporter of Congress MLA Amit Deshmukh, son of late Vilasrao Deshmukh. Assembly`s own security staff tried for a long time to convince Shinde to call of his impromptu "sit-in" protest but their pleas were ignored. Shinde had defeated Ramesh Karad of the BJP by 23,583 votes during the 2009 elections from Latur rural Assembly constituency. PTI