Weeks after ducking summons in the Rs 2,000-crore hawala scam, former Jharkhand chief minister Madhu Koda was today arrested by the Vigilance Bureau in a disproportionate assets case and remanded to 14 days judicial custody.
Koda, 38, was arrested from his residence in Chaibasa in West Singhbhum district and his former ministerial colleague Kamalesh Singh from Husseinabad in Palamau district. “We have reached a stage when his arrest was necessary. We had taken the arrest warrant from a competent court,” Inspector General of Police (Vigilance), M V Rao said.
Singh, who was a minister in four governments led by Shibu Soren, Arjun Munda, and Madhu Koda between 2005 and 2008, was arrested from Husseinabad after the summons by the vigilance court was were sent to the Superintendent of Police, Palamu, Jatin Narwal. Koda’s arrest followed his defiance of the Bureau’s summons to present himself on November 27 in the disproportionate assets case.
He had evaded three summons by the Enforcement Directorate, one by the Income Tax department and one by the Vigilance Bureau, saying he was busy campaigning for the Jharkhand assembly elections. While BJP slammed the Centre for the “delayed” action, the Congress and the RJD said the law will take its own course.
Koda’s meteoric rise
Within a short span of time, Koda experienced an eventful life from a labourer to the Chief Minister’s chair and now the district jail. He was a labourer who worked in the mines till the early 1990’s. What changed his life forever was his decision to join politics. He joined the BJP in 1994 and made his way to get a Bihar Assembly election ticket in 2000.
He became a minister after Jharkhand was formed. Since then, there has been no looking back for Koda. As a minister in both the Babulal Marandi government and the Arjun Munda government (2003 to 2005), Koda carved out his mine portfolio which gave him control over the state’s mineral wealth.
