Iron hand? Youth Cong shuts down Mumbai eatery, Modi cries intolerance

For all its talk of tolerance and the trumpeting of freedom of expression, the Congress it seems, has violent reactions to being criticised. In a shocking and shameful incident, a group of Congress workers in Mumbai forcibly shut down a popular restaurant in Parel because it had a message making fun of the UPA on its food bill. According to a report in Mid Day , “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.” And why? [caption id=“attachment_978613” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Reuters[/caption] The bill given to customers at the end of the meal contained the pithy message, ‘As per UPA government, eating money (2G, Coal, CWG scam) is a necessity and eating food in an AC restaurant is a luxury" Who ever else was laughing at the message, the Congress wasn’t. After arbitrarily deciding to shut down Aditi restaurant, the Congress workers went to the police and registered a case of defamation against the restaurant owner. The Mid Day report quoted a police officer as saying, “We have registered a non-cognisable complaint (NC) against the restaurant for printing matter known to be defamatory (Section 501 of IPC) and have settled the matter for now. The restaurant owner has promised that he will not circulate those bills now.” Ironically it was the self same Maharashtra Congress wing that cried itself hoarse in outrage when two girls in Palghar were arrested for posting Facebook status messages questioning the bandh in the state following the death of Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray. A Hindustan Times report captured the mood in the party then, as follows: “Congress ministers Naseem Khan, Nitin Raut and Varsha Gaikwad in a cabinet meeting cornered (Home Minister) RR Patil by demanding that action be taken against the police officials.  Why did the police succumb to Sena pressure? There is no need to wait for the report [the Konkan inspector general is probing the incident] as, prima facie, it is clear that police are guilty of high-handedness,” said Khan. Raut also questioned why a section like 295, which is generally applied for hurting religious sentiments, was slapped in this case, and why the girls were arrested late in the night, in violation of law"  “Why did the police succumb to Sena pressure? There is no need to wait for the report [the Konkan inspector general is probing the incident] as, prima facie, it is clear that police are guilty of high-handedness,” said Khan. It would seem then that the Congress is only against ‘high handedness’ when it is not carried out by one of its own. Predictably the incident has led to outrage on social media with even Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi weighing in:Here are some other reactions on the social media platform: