Maharashtra BJP stunned after MLA comes up with list of corrupt bureaucrats

Shiv Kumar

Tribune News Service

Mumbai, August 21

Revelations of corruption in Maharashtra by ruling party MLA Anil Gote has shaken up senior leaders including several ministers in the Devendra Fadnavis government.

Gote told reporters over the weekend that he would be presenting a list of corrupt bureaucrats to officials in the Prime Minister's Office on Tuesday. “I will be giving a detailed list of corrupt bureaucrats and documentary evidence to the Prime Minister's Office,” Gote has been quoted as saying.

The MLA went on to say that he planned to meet Jitendra Singh, Minister of State in the PMO, to present the documentary evidence collected by him.

Sources say the outspoken BJP MLA has drawn up a list of bureaucrats who may have acquired farmland in areas earmarked for major projects in order to make a killing when land acquisition formally began. Gote had alleged earlier that several bureaucrats and politicians had purchased farmland along the proposed Mumbai-Nagpur expressway before the project was notified by the state government.

Last month Gote scored big when IAS officer Radheshyam Mopalwar resigned as vice-chairman of the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation. Mopalwar was handpicked by Fadnavis to complete acquisition of land for the Mumbai-Nagpur expressway. Audio clips allegedly featuring Mopalwar in discussions about passing on bribes to higher ups in the Maharashtra secretariat were broadcast on local television channels forcing the chief minister to suspend Mopalwar.

Observers here feel that Gote may have helped leak the taped conversations to the media. “Some people in the state government are still backing Mopalwar,” Gote told reporters here.

Several senior BJP leaders in Maharashtra want the higher-ups in the BJP to discipline Gote before the allegations snowball into a major scandal for the state government. While senior minister Eknath Khadse had to resign after allegations of corruption, several others like Women and Child Development Minister Pankaja Munde, Housing Minister
Prakash Mehta and Industries Minister Subhash Desai continue in the cabinet despite allegations against them.