Beed sarpanch murder Ajit Pawar meets family Jarange warns of intensified agitation

Beed, Nov 29 (PTI) Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Saturday visited the family of Santosh Deshmukh, the sarpanch of Massajog village in Beed district who was abducted and brutally murdered about one year ago.
    Speaking at another event, Maratha leader Manoj Jarange said the Deshmukh family had not got justice, and called on the Maratha community, to which Deshmukh belonged, to unite "to protect our own".
    Ajit Pawar, who is the guardian minister of Beed, was accompanied by Nationalist Congress Party MLAs Prakash Solanke and Vijaysinh Pandit as he visited the village.
     Jarange, leader of the Maratha reservation agitation, spoke at a gathering to mark Deshmukh's first death anniversary as per Hindu calendar.
    
    "If the other side has no `sanskar' (values), we can not abide by sanskar either...we come and just shed tears with the family....we should behave according to the tendencies of the other side," he said, adding, "violence can not be countered by non-violence."
    One of the accused in the case is still missing, Jarange said, adding that he does not have any hope from deputy CM Ajit Pawar.
    Suresh Dhas, the BJP MLA from Ashti in the district, demanded that the accused in the Deshmukh murder case get death sentence.
    Santosh Deshmukh was abducted and brutally murdered on December 9, 2024. It was alleged that he was killed for opposing an attempt to extort money from a wind energy firm operating in the area.
    Walmik Karad, a close aide of NCP leader and then Maharashtra minister Dhananjay Munde, was arrested in the extortion case weeks after the murder. Munde later stepped down as minister due to growing criticism.

(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)