Chhagan Bhujbal

The Enforcement Directorate (ED), is preparing itself to seize a plot in Kharghar, Navi Mumbai, promoted by Pankaj Bhujbal and nephew Samir Bhujbal, the son & nephew of NCP Leader Chhagan Bhujbal respectively. The ED is already investigating a money- laundering case against the Nationalist Congress Party leader and former Public Works Department (PWD) minister Chhagan Bhujbal.

The land pertains to an alleged cheating case in the construction of a residential building, Hex World. The proposed project concerns 2,300 people, who had booked houses in it. Pankaj and Samir have allegedly collected around Rs 44 crore. Due to several problems with the owner of the adjoining plot, the building could not be completed.

This would be the first big attachment since the ED registered two money laundering cases against Chhagan, Pankaj & Samir along with 19 others three months ago for having undertaken illegal transactions to the tune of Rs 900 crore, under the provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

As per reports from ED officials, the land was purchased in the fake names of Blue Circle Infrastructure & Shivyash Developers. However, were  utilised for the proposed project by Devisha Infrastructure Pvt Ltd. Which is owned by Pankaj & Samir.

The ED investigation is based on two FIRs filed by the Anti-Corruption Bureau of Maharashtra police against Bhujbal for alleged irregularities in the allotment of a prime plot at Kalina worth Rs 88 crore. While the second case was for large-scale abnormalities for nearly Rs 749 crore in the construction of Maharashtra Sadan, government guest house in Delhi. The PWD, under Chhagan Bhujbal, had purportedly awarded sub-contracts on the Andheri-RTO land without inviting tenders.

Image credits: ABP Maza

KDMC (Kalyan – Dombivli Municipal Corporation) elections are scheduled for the month of October 2015. On last Friday, KDMC declared a list of reserve wards, which also indicated that 27 new villages are in the list. However; for the demarcation of wards KDMC used the census data of 2011. But story doesn’t end here because NCP (Nationalist Congress Party) has opposed and demands that new wards in these villages should be formed and after that they should be involved in the reserved category.

It is expected that elections of KMDC can be the exciting event as recently Kalyan – Dombivli Municipal Corporation has included 27 villages in the jurisdiction. Upcoming KMDC elections are gaining controversy and fueling more news after the declaration of new wards under the reserved category. According to reports, there are 50 per cent reservations for women in each ward. As per the statement of Pramod Indurao, VP of NCP, Maharastra, “KMDC has declared reserved wards without any demarcation of the wards. We are opposing the new list of KMDC and soon we are planning to meet the state election commission”.

According to census data of 2011, the population of Kalyan and Dombivli is about 15, 18,762 lakh and there are total 107 seats in the Kalyan – Dombivli Municipal Corporation. With the inclusion of new wards now total number of seat are 122, but our party believes that there should be more seats. Pramod Indurao added that, “There should be at-least 140 seats for 140 wards, as KMDC are using the old census data, so there are need to include current population as well for the ward demarcation”. Out of total 122 seats, 12 seats are reserved for the SC (Scheduled Caste) and 3 seats are reserved for the ST (Scheduled Tribes). And rest 74 seats are open seats and 33 seats are for OBCs. However; there are 50 per cent reservations for women in each ward.

As per the officials of KMDC, “We have used the census data of 2011 for the ward demarcation, The elections will be held as per the order of state election commissions and we have done the ward demarcation according to that. If NCP have any objection on the number of reserved seats in elections, so they can raise their complaint with EC till 10^th August 2015”.