Hours after Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation partially demolished the Mumbai office of actress Kangana Ranaut on Sepetmber 9 (Wednesday), the Bombay High Court asked the BMC to explain its conduct and stayed the demolition.
The BMC claimed it demolished “illegal alterations’ that is inappropriate and illegal construction in the office.
In response to Rizwan Siddiqui’s plea on behalf of Ranaut, the HC said, “The action of the BMC is illegal, arbitrary, mala fide and without the application of mind, in violation of principles of natural justice, unreasonable and improper.”
The court said, “From the notice, it is clear beyond any doubt that the works which are ‘unauthorised’ have not come up overnight. However, all of a sudden, the Corporation appears to have overnight woken up from its slumber, issued notice to the Petitioner (Ms. Ranaut), that too when she is out of the state, directing her to respond within 24 hours, and not granting her any further time, despite written request, and proceedings to demolish the said premises upon completion of 24 hours.”
Ranaut took her to Twitter and wrote, “My office was suddenly declared illegal in last 24 hours, they have destroyed everything inside… and now I am getting threats they will come to my house and break it as well, I am glad my judgement of movie mafia’s favourite world’s best CM was right.”
While sharing the pictures of demolished office on her Twitter, she wrote, “Pakistan… #deathofdemocracy.” In another tweet, she wrote, “Babar and his army.” In one of her tweets, the actress compared Mumbai to Pakistan occupied Kashmir.
She also showed her frustration through a video message, saying, “Uddhav Thackeray, what do you think, you along with film mafia have taken revenge by demolishing my house? Today you demolished my house, tomorrow your ego will crumble. This is a wheel of time, remember it is never constant. I think you owe me, beacuse I knew what Kashmiri Pandits are suffering through, but today I felt that.”