Slap homicide charge in female foeticide cases: Bhujbal

Senior Maharashtra Minister Chhagan Bhujbal has demanded that homicide cases be filed against those involved in female foeticide.

"Homicide cases should be filed against those indulging in female foeticide in the progressive state of Maharashtra, which has given social reformers like Phule, Shahu Maharaj and Ambedkar," the Nationalist Congress Party leader said.

Bhujbal, who holds the PWD portfolio, made the demand in a letter he wrote to Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, his spokesperson said in Mumbai on Monday.

In the letter, Bhujbal has cited a resolution on female foeticide adopted at a meeting of the Samata Parishad  (an OBC outfit founded by the NCP leader).

A string of female foeticide cases were recently reported from Beed district in Central Maharashtra. Another resolution adopted at the meet, held in Ahmednagar recently, demanded that Maratha sub-castes be given reservation in jobs, education, politics,  without disturbing  the existing quota ((27 per cent) for OBCs.

Meanwhile, the NCP will organise a programme to educate warkari community (devotees of Lord Vitthal) about importance of the girl child during the Ashadi Ekadashi festival.

The party's women's wing would organise folk songs and dances on the routes to be taken by warkaris during their travel to the holy town of Pandharpur.

The programme will be flagged off from Baramati, native place of Union Agriculture Minister and NCP President Sharad Pawar, on Tuesday. It will be organised in more than six cities, which fall in route to Pandharpur.

Talking to PTI in Solapur, State NCP mahila unit President Vidya Lolge said there is a need to tell people that  foeticide is a serious crime.