Massajog sarpanch the late Santosh Deshmukh’s brother Dhananjay climbed up a water tank in the village demanding MCOCA against Walmik Karad, one of the accused in the Beed extortion case which is suspected of having led to Deshmukh’s murder on December 9, 2024. On Monday morning, Dhananjay refused to climb down despite Maratha activist Manoj Jarange and district SP’s requests, but relented after a couple of hours, demanding that the police give him and his family a probe update and fulfil the demand by 10 am on Tuesday, failing which he threatened a mass suicide by his family and the fellow villagers.

According to reports, the drama began early in the morning when Dhananjay escaped the police eye to reach the water tank that supplies water to the village. The police were stationed in the village because he had threatened to climb up a cell phone tower. The villagers gathered near the tank and the chief of Beed district police Navneet Kanwat also reached. Jarange and Kanwat urged Dhananjay to get down but he refused. Meanwhile, the rest of the Deshmukh family and some villagers also climbed up the tank, but couldn’t go up further.