Jogi arrested in NCP leader's murder case

Former Chhattisgarh chief minister and Congress Working Committee member Ajit Jogi was today arrested in connection with the sensational murder of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) state treasurer Ramavatar Jaggi in June 2003.

Jogi, a sitting Member of Parliament from Mahasamund in Chhattisgarh, was the the chief minister of the state when the murder occurred.

The arrest was made in Gandai, a remote area in Rajnandgaon district when the Congress leader was campaigning for the Congress candidate for the coming Rajnandgaon Lok Sabha bypoll.

The arrest was made after a local court here issued an arrest warrant against Jogi while acting on a complaint filed by Satish Jaggi, the son of the slain NCP leader.

Police have put him at a rest house in Kawardha town, 210 km southwest from the state capital.

Jaggi, the treasurer of the state's NCP unit, was shot dead in Raipur in front of a police station on June 4, 2003. His son Satish Jaggi registered an FIR with a local police station here an hour after the shootout.

Chhattisgarh's BJP government handed over the case to the CBI in December 2003. In 2005, the CBI arrested Jogi's son, Amit, and his two close associates on the charges of plotting the murder. He was kept in the Raipur central jail for 10 months and released on bail in May 2006.

Meanwhile, tension mounted in Rajnandgaon soon after the arrest of Jogi was made public late this evening.

Thousands of workers along with senior Congress leaders have reached Kawardha""the home-town of chief minister Dr Raman Singh""and ghearoed the rest house where Jogi has been detained.

A senior police official said additional force had been sent to Kawardha to maintain law and order.