The Aam Aadmi Party has filed a public interest litigation (PIL) in the Bombay high court accusing state PWD minister Chhagan Bhujbal of misusing his position by receiving kickbacks on projects.
AAP's petition alleged that as PWD minister, Bhujbal had favoured a contractor by the name of Chamankar Enterprises to rebuild the Maharashtra Sadan in Mumbai and Delhi at a cost of Rs 100 crore. "The contractor had in turn made payments to two companies, namely, Origin Infrastructure Pvt Ltd and Ideen Furniture, which were controlled by Bhujbal and his relatives," says the PIL. It also asked for the registration of an FIR against Bhujbal and his relatives and sought for a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the allegations.
On Thursday, Bhujbal's counsel Prasad Dhakepalkar argued that the petition was not maintainable. A division bench of chief justice Mohit Shah and justice MS Sonak then directed him to file a short affidavit within two weeks in support of his contention. The court also allowed AAP to file a rejoinder two weeks after Bhujbal files an affidavit.
Anil Anturkar and Sugandh Deshmukh, counsels for AAP, claimed that the modus operandi was to favour the contractor who in turn made payments to the two companies. The petition alleged that between December 7, 2007 and May 9, 2011, an amount of Rs 36.77 lakh was paid by Chamankar Enterprises to Origin Infrastructure which was entirely under the control of Bhujbal. One of the directors of Origin Infra was Sanjay Joshi, who is an employee of the Mumbai Education Trust run by Bhujbal, the petition said.
Moreover, between February 12, 2010 and January 20, 2012, Rs 74.10 lakh was disbursed by Chamankar Enterprises to Ideen Furniture, whose directors are Vishaka Bhujbal and Shefali Bhujbal, wives of Pankaj Bhujbal and Sameer Bhujbal, the minister's son and nephew respectively, says the petition.
AAP said it had sent representations to the state governor, the chief minister, the income tax commissioner, the director general of the anti-corruption bureau and the chief vigilance commissioner on alleged kickbacks received by Bhujbal, but no action was taken. That was when they decided to move the high court.
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