Hit the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) where it hurts, this seems to be the new strategy of Uttarakhand Chief Minister Harish Rawat in the run-up to the general elections.
Faced with severe internal squabbling in the ruling Congress, Rawat has decided to rake up corruption issues against senior BJP leader and former chief minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank in a big way with an indication that the government would take action against him.
"Be it Kumbh mela or the Citurgia issue, people want to know who was the real culprit," said Rawat as he began attacking BJP in his rallies in Haridwar, where his wife Renuka Rawat is the front runner for the Congress ticket. Nishank is the BJP candidate from Haridwar. During the past few days, Nishank had been challenging Rawat to contest against him from Haridwar.
The latest salvo by Rawat is being seen as a well-planned "guided missile" to hit the BJP in view of a series of desertions by top Congress leaders like Satpal Maharaj and Matbar Singh Kandari. On the other hand, Nishank dismissed the allegations as "baseless."
Significantly, the former Vijay Bahuguna government had put the first report of the
K L Bhati Commission, which probed the alleged scandals of the former BJP government, on the back-burner.
Though senior government officials were not ready to comment on the issue, the ruling Congress party leaders said Rawat is ready to initiate any action against some BJP leaders who were allegedly involved in misappropriation of funds and irregularities in various projects.
Bhati, a retired IAS officer, began the inquiry in 2012 on what is being described by the ruling Congress as "loot of Uttarakhand" during the former BJP government.
Bhati, who probed a total of six scams, submitted a report on alleged irregularities in the Uttarakhand Seeds and Terai Corporation Ltd (USTCL) to the government and later tabled in the state assembly on March 19 last year.
However, soon after submitting the report, Bhati resigned following a controversy over his official residence. Later, Bhati was replaced by S C Tripathi, who is also a retired IAS officer. Since then, there has been no report regarding the Tripathi commission of inquiry against the BJP scandals.
Though, the main focus of the Bhati investigation was on the Maha Kumbh scam where the central funds to the tune of Rs 500-600 crore were allegedly misused and misappropriated, he chose to submit report only on USTCL.
Senior Congress leaders said the fate of the Tripathi commission of inquiry is also not known.
Senior Congress leaders had stated that the government would initiate legal action against the guilty after the completion of the inquiry report. "Those who have looted Uttarakhand should not go scot-free," Birendra Chaudhary, who was the then incharge of Uttarakhand affairs had said.
Bahuguna had set up the one-man inquiry commission headed by Bhati to probe six scandals that rocked during the BJP government which also led to the removal of the then chief minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank.
The commission is probing alleged irregularities in allotment of 56 hydropower projects, Citurgia housing project, Maha Kumbh mela, centrally sponsored schemes, Uttarakhand Seeds and Terai Seeds Corporation and funds for disaster management during the tenure of former chief minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank.
