Siddaramaiah involved in MUDA, Valmiki Corporation 'scams', must resign: BJP's Shobha Karandlaje
New Delhi (PTI): Union Minister Shobha Karandlaje demanded on Tuesday Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's resignation, claiming that he was involved in the alleged Mysuru Urban Development Authority and Karnataka Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribe Development Corporation scams.
At a press conference at the BJP headquarters here, Karandlaje said Siddaramaiah must immediately tender his resignation for a "fair and impartial" probe to take place in the matter as he also holds the state finance minister's portfolio and is trying to "cover-up" the financial irregularities that took place at his behest in the two corporations.
"He (Siddaramaiah) has taken money, not just from the Valmiki Development Corporation but from every corporation in the state. It should be probed. At the behest of Siddaramaiah, Rs 187 crore was illegally transferred from the Valmiki Development Corporation to Hyderabad. Money belonging to SCs, STs and the poor was used in funding the Telangana assembly elections," the BJP leader charged.
"He is also involved in the MUDA land scam. Siddaramaiah's wife was allotted plots under a 50:50 ratio scheme. And he is trying to hush up and cover up the scams. He must immediately resign so that a fair and impartial probe can take place," she alleged.
The Union minister also said that Karnataka has become "an ATM for the Congress and its high command".
Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe Sub Plan funds are being diverted to fund the implementation of the guarantees that Congress gave the people of the state during the elections, she charged.
The BJP is up in arms against the ruling Congress in Karnataka, claiming that Siddaramaiah was involved in the two cases of financial irregularities in the state corporations.
The illegal money transfer issue involving the Karnataka Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation Ltd came to the fore after its accounts superintendent Chandrashekhar P died by suicide on May 26, leaving behind a note.
The note alleged an unauthorised transfer of Rs 187 crore from the corporation's bank account. It also claimed that Rs 88.62 crore of the total amount was moved to various accounts belonging to "well-known" IT companies and a Hyderabad-based cooperative bank among others.
Following the allegations against him in connection with the "scam", Scheduled Tribes Welfare Minister B Nagendra tendered his resignation on June 6. He is currently in Enforcement Directorate custody.
The MUDA case is linked to the fraudulent allotment of sites by the authority to land losers and involves plots given to Siddaramaiah's wife Parvathi.
MUDA had allotted plots to Parvathi under a 50:50 ratio scheme in place of 3.16 acres of her land where it developed a residential layout.
The controversial scheme envisages allotting 50 per cent of developed land to the land-loser in lieu of undeveloped land acquired for forming layouts.
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Bank account in Ramgarh tracked for fraudulent fund transactions across 24 states, 4 arrested
Ramgarh (Jharkhand) (PTI): Jharkhand police on Thursday said it has unearthed a network of interstate cyber frauds and arrested four miscreants for fraudulent transactions through a bank account in Ramgarh district after complaints of 274 suspected transactions in 24 states.
The states where complaints for fraudulent transactions were registered included Maharashtra, Karnataka, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh.
The action followed inputs received through 'Samanvaya portal', a centralised, web-based platform launched by the Union Home Ministry to curb cybercrime.
"We arrested four cyber miscreants after a current account with Kuju (Ramgarh) branch of the State Bank of India was found to have registered suspected financial transactions in 24 states with the help of the Pratibimba portal of the Home Ministry through the Samanvaya portal," Ramgarh Superintendent of Police Mukesh Kumar Lunayat said.
During the probe, police found that the account was opened under the MSME Udyam Registration scheme in the name of Shree Ganesh Enterprises, he said.
The account had been linked to as many as 274 complaints from different states related to cyber fraud and illegal fund transfers.
The registered proprietors of the enterprise were identified as Rahul Gupta (37), Ravi Kumar Verma (34), and Ajay Sharma (33), all residents of Ramgarh district, a statement from the Ramgarh police said.
During interrogation, Rahul Gupta and Ravi Kumar Verma revealed that they had opened multiple current accounts at the behest of Ritesh Agrawal alias Munna (40) and Sonu Kumar Jha (34).
They admitted receiving Rs 1.2 lakh in exchange for facilitating the opening of these accounts.
"The accused further confessed to sharing OTPs, activating mobile banking services, and handing over control of the accounts to the main operators through WhatsApp and Telegram groups. These accounts were then allegedly used to route fraudulent transactions.
Police said mobile data analysis of the accused led to the recovery of crucial digital evidence, including details of SIM cards, bank accounts, passbooks, ATM cards, QR code scanners, Aadhaar cards, and PAN cards shared through messaging platforms.
A total of four accused have been arrested so far and sent to judicial custody.
A case has been registered at the Cyber Crime Police Station under relevant sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) 2023 and Sections 66C and 66D of the Information Technology Act, 2000.
Further investigation is underway, the police said.
