BJP minister Khadse resigns over allegations

Mumbai: Maharashtra’s Revenue Minister Eknath Khadse today resigned following allegations over irregularities over a land deal, corruption as well as other charges.

Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis tweeted: “I have received Eknath Khadse’s resignation and have forwarded this to the Governor.” He also added that Khadse had demanded an inquiry into the allegations against him. “A retired High Court judge will be appointed to conduct the inquiry.”

The 64-year-old ex-minister from Jalgaon in north Maharashtra is facing several charges: Khadse’s family purchased a plot in Pune that was acquired by the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation whilst the owner from whom they bought the land had been having a dispute with the MIDC over the acquisition of land. The plot was bought a very low rate of just Rs35.5 million though the actual price was around Rs350 million.

Khadse has also been facing allegations that he received telephone calls from the residence of India’s most wanted terrorist, Dawood Ebrahim, in Karachi. An ethical hacker claimed that calls were made from Karachi to Khadse’s phone. The Mumbai Police had however given a clean chit to Khadse who said his card had been cloned.

Preeti Sharma Menon of Aam Aadmi Party said “if a common citizen is found to be allegedly linked to a terrorist, he or she would be immediately arrested, interrogated and all his or her phones, mails, bank accounts would be scanned. We demand the same kind of investigation be conducted on Khadse.”

Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee chief Ashok Chavan, too, said that a judicial inquiry should be launched against Khadse, whose resignation was delayed.

Another charge was that one of his assistants had demanded a bribe of Rs300 million from a Mumbai-based entrepreneur in a land allotment matter that Khadse’s office handled.

Meanwhile, Khadse spoke to reporters at a press conference after submitting his resignation to Fadnavis and said that he has been framed. “For the last 40 years, I have been in politics but had not experienced a medial trial like this.”

“Many allegations have been levelled against me in the past and I have come clean … N o one has been able to give any proof till now. If anybody provides proof, I will quit politics,” he added.

Hitting out at his detractors within and outside the party, Khadse said this was “an attack on the BJP”.

The fast-paced developments happened a day after Fadnavis met BJP president Amit Shah in New Delhi and submitted a detailed report on the issues confronting Khadse.

Fadnavis later followed it up with a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and apprised him of the row that was denting the BJP’s “clean image” in the state.

Khadse had been under fire for the past few weeks from the ruling alliance partner Shiv Sena, as also the opposition Congress, Nationalist Congress Party, the Aam Aadmi Party and activists for various alleged acts of commission and omission.

Among the major accusations hurled at Khadse was allotting a prime industrial plot in Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) complex in Pune at a throwaway price and an allegation by an “ethical hacker” that his name figured on the regular call lists of absconding mafia don Dawood Ibrahim from his Karachi home.

The other charges against the minister related to an aide, Gajanan Patil, demanding a bribe of Rs30 crore in connection with a land proposal file in Kalyan, Thane.

Former AAP activist Anjali Damania’s allegations linked him to the multi-crore rupee irrigation scam. The latest were graft charges levelled by a fishermen’s society.

Once a claimant to the chief minister’s post, Khadse was assigned the departments of revenue, minorities development and wakf, state excise, relief and rehabilitation, earthquake rehabilitation, agriculture and horticulture, animal husbandry, dairy development and fisheries.

The opposition Congress leaders welcomed the resignation and demanded that other scam-tainted ministers should also be sacked.

“Khase should be arrested immediately and booked,” Mumbai Congress president Sanjay Nirupam said.

State Congress general secretary Sanjay Dutt termed the resignation as “a cover-up drama by Fadnavis” and demanded a probe by a high court judge into the allegations against Khadse.

“If Fadnavis is really sincere on acting against corruption and upholding propriety, he should similarly sack his other corrupt ministers,” Dutt said.

Senior Congress leader and newly-elected legislator Narayan Rane said the chief minister was playing games and “eliminating all backward classes leaders in the party and doing grave injustice to them”.

“First the BJP ruined Khadse’s image and after so many days of delay, they forced him to resign. Then, why did the state BJP chief Danve give him a clean chit only yesterday? Khadse is a victim of the internal strife and conspiracy between BJP-Shiv Sena. He should have immediately resigned after the charges were levelled against him.”

Ridiculing Khadse’s claims, opposition NCP senior leader Ajit Pawar said if the resignation was on “moral grounds”, why did he delay it for so long.

Another NCP senior leader Jitendra Awhad said it was shameful that a minister with “connections to Dawood Ibrahim” was in the cabinet and the resignation was natural. He demanded a probe into the allegations.

— with inputs from IANS