After he evaded Palghar police for two days, the deputy president of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) in Mokhada taluka, Ramdas Korde, was arrested on Sunday for subjecting a tribal man to bonded labour. Police said Korde went underground after a case was registered against him but he had wanted to surrender later. Korde had forced Kalu Pawar, 48, into bonded labour since November 2020 after the latter borrowed Rs 500 to buy a kafan — cloth used to wrap a dead body — for the last rites of his 13-year-old son. Korde has been booked by the police under the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, 1976.

The in-charge of Mokhada police station, Satish Gavai, said, “We arrested him on Sunday. After we registered a case against him, Korde went underground. We formed two teams to arrest him as initially, we learnt that he is hiding at his relatives’ house in Jawhar. But he was not there.