Evening Pulse: Thackerays booked in Mumbai as Sule and Raut take the voter roll fight to the Supreme Court

Since this morning, Maharashtra's voter roll fight has moved from the street to the courtroom and the police station. Mumbai Police have booked Aaditya Thackeray and Amit Thackeray over Sunday night's standoff at Shivaji Park. In Delhi, two of the state's best-known opposition MPs signed a petition against the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis accused the INDIA bloc of trying to lean on the country's top court.

Start in Mumbai. Shivaji Park police registered a case against 25 people over the crowd that gathered outside the station on Sunday to demand the release of detained protesters, UNI and The Statesman reported. Besides the two Thackeray cousins, those named include MNS leader Sandeep Deshpande and Shiv Sena (UBT) leaders Varun Sardesai and Mahesh Sawant. The Statesman reported that the charges include unlawful assembly under Section 189(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and breach of police orders. Police had said on Sunday that the gathering had no permission. None of the allegations has been tested in court.

Aaditya Thackeray answered by turning the case back on the government. He said the BJP government was scared of ordinary citizens, and he asked where Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and his MPs stood, according to The Statesman. Last night he warned of a Maharashtra bandh if party workers were touched. By this evening, no bandh call had been issued, and no direct Mahayuti reply to that warning or to the FIR had appeared in the reports we checked. Reports by early evening also did not describe a fresh round of mass detentions in Mumbai today.

Delhi was where the day's main action played out. INDIA bloc leaders set off from the Connaught Place area towards the Supreme Court in the afternoon. Police stopped them with barricades at Bhagwan Dass Road, about a kilometre short of the court, The Tribune and National Herald reported. Both papers listed NCP (SP) MP Supriya Sule and Shiv Sena (UBT) MP Sanjay Raut among the leaders at the front. Before the march, Sule told reporters the bloc would seek justice peacefully.

The march ended at the barricades, but the petition went in. Eleven leaders filed a plea in the Supreme Court challenging what they allege are large-scale voter deletions and irregularities in the SIR, IANS reported. Raut and Sule are among the petitioners, alongside Rahul Gandhi, Mallikarjun Kharge, Akhilesh Yadav and Tejashwi Yadav. NewsBytes reported that the plea also seeks the removal of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. The petition is pending, and the court has not yet said when it will hear it.

Fadnavis spoke before the march began. He asked where the Constitution requires the Chief Justice of India to meet a protest march. He said people with a grievance should go to court and fight it legally, and he called the opposition's conduct an attempt to demonise judicial institutions, ANI and the Free Press Journal reported. By evening, the opposition had in fact gone to court, the route he had pointed to.

The SIR claims window, which we flagged this morning, closed today. No further extension for Maharashtra had been announced by this evening. The state election office had not yet published a final count of forms received; the last public figure was about 6.24 lakh forms up to 4 October. The final roll is still due on 16 November.

In Pune, the Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) inquiry now has its full membership. Retired judge Dilip Bhosale will chair it, with retired judge P.D. Naik, IPS officer Laxmi Gautam and former IAS officer Ganesh Patil as members. FDA Commissioner Tukaram Mundhe will serve as secretary, ANI and Lokshahi reported. ThePrint, carrying ANI's report, said minister Shivendraraje Bhosale had promised to withdraw cases against protesting students. No formal order setting the panel's terms of reference or its deadline had been reported by this evening. Chairman Vivek Bhimanwar remains on leave.

The drought file did not move today. We found no reported date for the central team's report or for the meeting that will decide Maharashtra's relief package.