The arrest of Shiv Sena MLA Sureshdada Jain has added to the growing list of Maharashtra legislators and parliamentarians who are under the scanner of the law. Cutting across party lines, all of them are facing serious criminal charges and many are at present behind bars.
A veteran legislator, Jain was arrested on Saturday night in Jalgaon district for alleged involvement in a multi-crore housing scam. There are about 90 other accused in the case, one of whom is senior NCP leader and minister of state for transport Gulabrao Deokar.
Jain's detention comes not too long after Mumbai police registered a disproportionate assets case against former Mumbai Congress chief Kripashankar Singh on the orders of the Bombay High Court. The senior Congressman has been charged under the Prevention Of Corruption Act and for criminal breach of trust by a public servant, forgery, cheating and destruction of evidence. Acting on the HC's orders, cops have attached several properties ostensibly belonging to Singh and his family.
Given such cases , political watchers say that Maharashtra politicians have rarely come under such scrutiny. And rarely has their credibility hit such a low.
Last January, the CBI registered a case against Ashok Chavan in the Adarsh scam. He has been accused of granting favours to the housing society and of misusing his office to get society membership for his relatives. Another accused in the scam, Kanhaiyalal Gidwani, a former Shiv Sena legislator-turned-Congressman , was arrested this month for allegedly bribing a CBI counsel to water down the charges in the Adarsh case.
Last December, Shivajirao Kardile, a four-term legislator from Ahmednagar, was arrested in the murder case of social worker Ashok Lande. According to the police, BJP MLA Kardile tried to buy the silence of Lande's relatives. He has been booked for criminal conspiracy and is currently in jail. He has also been charged in a land-grabbing case.
Congress MLA from Parbhani Ramprasad Bordikar was arrested by the Parbhani police on February 29 this year. The chairman of the Parbhani District Central Cooperative Bank, Bordikar allegedly launched an insurance scheme for the bank's employees, secured premium from them and then siphoned off Rs 6.5 crore. He has been accused of forgery and cheating and is at present out on bail.
Then there is the instance of Pune MP Suresh Kalmadi. He was arrested by the CBI last April in connection with the Commonwealth Games scam. He is out on bail.
CASE REGISTRY
Several Maharashtra politicians have been accused in serious cases lately. Political watchers say rarely has the scrutiny on our netas been so high:
Sureshdada Jain | MLA (Jalgaon) | SHIV SENA |
Arrested on March 11, 2012, on charges of criminal conspiracy, cheating and forgery in a Jalgaon affordable housing case
Kripashankar Singh | MLA (Kalina) | CONGRESS |
Charged in a disproportionate assets case on February 28, 2012, under Prevention Of Corruption Act and under IPC sections for criminal breach of trust by a public servant, forgery, cheating and destruction of evidence
Ashok Chavan | Former CM | CONGRESS |
Charged in association with the Adarsh housing society scam on January 29, 2010, under the Prevention
Of Corruption Act and IPC sections for
criminal conspiracy, cheating and forgery
Ramprasad Bordikar | MLA (Parbhani) |
CONGRESS |
Arrested on January 17, 2012, in a forgery case involving Parbhani District Central Cooperative Bank, of which he is the chairman. Charged of cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy
Suresh Kalmadi | MP (Pune) | CONGRESS |
Arrested on April 25, 2011, on charges of forgery, cheating and criminal conspiracy for alleged involvement in the Commonwealth Games scam. Currently out on bail
Kanhaiyalal Gidwani | Former MLC | SENA-TURNEDCONGRESSMAN |
Arrested on March 6, 2012, for allegedly bribing a CBI counsel to water down the charges in the Adarsh case. Charged under the Prevention of Corruption Act and of cheating and criminal conspiracy
Padamsinh Patil | MP (Osmanabad) | NCP |
Arrested on June 6, 2009, in the murder case of NCP leader Pawan Raje Nimbalkar. Released on bail in September 2009. Facing charges of murder and criminal conspiracy
Shivajirao Kardile | MLA (Ahmednagar) | BJP |
Arrested on December 8, 2011, on charges of criminal conspiracy in a murder and land grabbing case. Still in prison
Gulabrao Deokar | MLA (Jalgaon) | NCP |
Charged on February 3, 2006, on charges of forgery, cheating and criminal conspiracy in a Jalgaon
mass affordable housing case
Sena may not fully back MLA
Shiv Sena CEO Uddhav Thackeray has demanded a thorough probe into the Jalgaon housing scandal which led to Sena MLA Suresh Jain's arrest on Sunday. "There should be a proper and impartial inquiry into the housing scandal. The government should also find out if Jain has been arrested for political reasons," Uddhav said on Monday.
The Sena leader reportedly added that there was no room for scandals in the Sena, in a clear indication that Matoshree may not pull out all the stops to defend Jain in the assembly. A former minister in the Sena-BJP government in the 1990s, Jain is a Sena MLA from Jalgaon. Many Sainiks said Jain is not a "true-blue" Shiv Sainik. "Jain, who was earlier in the NCP, keeps hopping from one party to the other," a Sena functionary said. The response to the Jalgaon Sena unit's bandh call on Monday was "mixed" , Sena sources said.
The Sena has also trained its guns on NCP minister Gulabrao Deokar, who was president of the Jalgaon civic body when the scam broke. He is now a minister of state and guardian minister for Jalgaon district. The Sena has demanded that Deokar be arrested. The BJP is set to close in on both Jain and Deokar in the assembly. The DF's plan is to harp on l'affaire Jain to silence opposition guns on the Kripashankar Singh issue.
- Ambarish Mishra
