Anti-Corruption Bureau has filed a fresh case against former Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister and 11 others, including his four family members, for allegedly amassing Rs 203 crore disproportionate to known sources of his income, a police official said today.
The FIR was filed by ACB yesterday, in which apart from Bhujbal, his wife Meena, son Pankaj, daughter-in-law Vishakha and nephew Sameer, have been named as accused, the official said.
Chartered accountants Sunil Naik and Chandrashekar Sarda, hawala operator Suresh Jajodia, directors of Bhujbal's companies Pravinkumar Jain and Jagdishprasad Purohit, financial advisor Sanjeev Jain, and chief managing director of Snehal Cooperative Ltd Kapil Puri have also been named as other accused in the FIR, he said.
While investigating the alleged offences of cheating, forgery and corruption against Chhagan Bhujbal in two cases -- Central Library land scam and Maharashtra Sadan scam --ACB further found "ill-gotten" wealth, after which the fresh FIR was filed.
In the FIR, the anti-graft agency said that the amassed assets were beyond the known income sources.
The official said ACB had carried out searches at Chhagan Bhujbal's houses and offices and recovered documents showing properties at several places in the city, satellite cities of Mumbai as well as at Pune, Lonavala and Nashik.
According to the investigators, Bhujbal, along with Pankaj, Sameer and Naik, had allegedly opened bogus companies for money laundering, police said.
In February this year, ACB had filed a charge sheet against Bhujbal and his kin in the multi-crore rupee Maharashtra Sadan construction scam. Subsequently, Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested the Chhagan Bhujbal, the senior NCP leader, and Sameer in a money laundering case connected to the scam. Both of them are currently lodged at the Arthur Road jail in Mumbai.
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Responding to the development, Chhagan Bhujbal, in a
statement issued today, said "how many false cases is the government going to file against me?"
"While filing cases against us, care was taken to apply sections due to which we won't get bail," he said.
"Our rivals are making efforts to see that the Bhujbals' lives end before it is proved in court that we are not guilty," the statement quoted the NCP leader as saying.
Referring to the Maharashtra Sadan 'scam', Bhujbal said "it is assumed that we got Rs 800 crore through this. The fact is that Chamankar (the developer) did not get an inch of land or a single rupee from the government.
