BJP MLA Madal Virupakshappa facing bribery charges deposes before Lokayukta cops
Bengaluru, Mar 9: In eye of storm, BJP MLA Madal Virupakshappa, who is an accused in a bribe case deposed before the Lokayukta police here on Thursday.
Flanked by a lawyer and policemen, the MLA from Channagiri constituency in Davangere reached the Lokayukta office.
According to Lokayukta sources, Deputy Superintendent of Police Antony John J K, who has been appointed as the investigation officer, is interrogating the MLA.
Virupakshappa, who resigned as the Karnataka Soaps and Detergents Limited (KSDL) chairman, is accused of collecting bribe through his son from contractors supplying raw material for the KSDL.
The Lokayukta sleuths had arrested Virupakshappa's son Prashanth Kumar M V from the KSDL office on March 2 while allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 40 lakh from a contractor.
Prashanth Kumar is the chief accounts officer of the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board.
Further searches led to the recovery of Rs 8.23 crore from the KSDL office and the MLA's house.
The interrogation will revolve around the cash haul in KSDL office and MLA's house.
Accepting that the huge cache of money found in his house belonged to his family, the BJP MLA, who got anticipatory bail on Tuesday told reporters, ''Our Taluk is known as the land of arecanut (supari). An ordinary farmer in our arecanut land has Rs five to six crore at home. I have 125 acres arecanut farm, arecanut market, and I have many other businesses as well. I will furnish the appropriate documents to the Lokayukta and get back my money.''
According to the Lokayukta sources, huge quantity of gold, silver ornaments were found in the MLA's house besides large investment in land.
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Surat LS candidate Nilesh Kumbhani whose nomination form was rejected suspended from Congress
Ahmedabad, Apr 25: The Gujarat Congress on Friday suspended from the party for six years its Surat Lok Sabha candidate Nilesh Kumbhani, whose nomination form was rejected over discrepancies leading to the BJP's Mukesh Dalal getting elected unopposed.
A statement from the Congress said the party's disciplinary committee decided to suspend Kumbhani after thorough discussion, adding it had come to the conclusion that the nomination form was rejected due to gross negligence on his part or "in connivance with the BJP".
"To be fair to you we have given time to you to explain your case but instead of coming before the party disciplinary committee you have gone incommunicado. After your form was rejected by the authorities, BJP went ahead and got form of other eight candidates withdrawn. This has deprived people of Surat their voting rights," the Congress disciplinary committee headed by Balu Patel said.
"People of Surat and party workers have become very angry due to your action and are expressing their anger in different ways. The Congress party has decided to suspend you for six years from the party," the press note said.
Kumbhani's nomination form was rejected on April 21 after his three proposers submitted affidavits to the district returning officer claiming the signatures on the document was not theirs.
The nomination form of Suresh Padsala, the Congress' substitute candidate from Surat, was also invalidated on the same grounds.
In his order, Returning Officer Sourabh Pardhi said the three nomination forms submitted by Kumbhani and Padsala were rejected after prima facie discrepancy was found in the signatures of the proposers and they did not appear to be genuine.
Kumbhani, a former corporator from Surat, had unsuccessfully fought the 2022 Assembly polls from Kamrej there.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's Mukesh Dalal was elected unopposed from Surat Lok Sabha constituency on April 22 after all other nominees, including one from BSP, withdrew from the fray one by one on the last day of withdrawing papers.
