Aditi hotel in Mumbai reopened, Congress denies forcing it shut

The arbitrary closure of a popular Mumbai eatery in Parel, purportedly by a group of Congress youth workers, has generated massive outrage on social media but party workers are saying that they did nothing wrong. A report in the Mid Day newspaper said “Around 30 to 35 workers of the Indian Youth Congress — which is chaired by party vice-president Rahul Gandhi — approached the restaurant, Aditi Pure Veg, around 3 pm. Led by Ganesh Kumar Yadav, city president of the party’s youth wing, and party MLA Kalidas Kolambkar, they approached the hotel and asked the owner to shut shop.” [caption id=“attachment_978877” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  AFP[/caption] However Ganesh Kumar Yadav, Chief of the Mumbai Youth Congress wing told media that nothing of the sort had happened. “We were just demonstrating peacefully against the defamatory message on the bill printed by the restaurant”, he said, adding that following the protest, they had registered a complaint with the police. The ‘defamatory’ bill in question read, ‘As per UPA government, eating money (2G, Coal, CWG scam) is a necessity and eating food in an AC restaurant is a luxury”. The restaurant has since reopened, but the message in question has been removed. [embedalsosee] “What do they mean we are ’eating’ money?“asked Yadav angrily. He claimed the message on the bill was an attempt to malign the image of the party and accused the eatery of working as a front for other political parties. “This restaurant is housed in an illegal structure endorsed by the BMC, which is being run by the Sena - BJP, which means he is backed by these parties”, Yadav added. The news of the closure of the restaurant generated massive outrage both online and off it. Among those condemning the Congress actions were Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi who tweeted that the incident was the ‘height of intolerance’.