Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut has accused central probe businesses of settling political scores.
New Delhi:
Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut on Tuesday wrote to Rajya Sabha Chairman Venkaiah Naidu alleging that the Enforcement Directorate has been harassing him and his household after he refused to assist in toppling the Maharashtra authorities. He mentioned that the ED and different investigating company officers “at the moment are diminished to puppets of their political masters” and added that the officers have even admitted that they’ve been “requested by their ‘bosses’ to ‘repair’ me.”
Mr Raut made sensational claims, including that he was threatened with imprisonment if he refused to assist in forcing a mid-term election within the state.
“A few month in the past, I used to be approached by sure individuals and was informed to help them in toppling the state authorities in Maharashtra. They needed me to be instrumental in such endeavour in order that the state might be pressured right into a midterm election. I refused to be a celebration to any such clandestine agenda which was being pursued, upon which I used to be warned that my refusal may result in my paying a really heavy worth. I used to be even informed that my destiny might be like that of a former union railway minister who spent a few years behind bars. I used to be even warned that aside from me, two different senior ministers within the cupboard of the state of Maharashtra in addition to two senior leaders in Maharashtra would even be despatched behind the bars beneath the PMLA Act which might result in midterm elections within the state of Maharashtra with all essential leaders within the state being behind bars,” he mentioned.
सत्यमेव जयते.. pic.twitter.com/ImdX7wPuYa
— Sanjay Raut (@rautsanjay61) February 8, 2022
The Shiv Sena MP mentioned that his household owns some land, barely 1 acre, at Alibaug which was bought about 17 years in the past however those that offered the land, together with their relations, are being threatened by the ED and different businesses to provide statements towards him saying that they acquired some money from him over and above the settlement worth.
“That is additionally occurring to different individuals who had offered a equally small piece of land to me and my household in 2012-2013. Day after day, ED and different businesses personnel name these individuals and threaten them with jail and attachment of their private properties until they offer their statements towards me. All these properties are within the public area and have been filed in all my affidavits filed together with my nomination papers for the Rajya Sabha. For all these years, there was no query requested of me. Nonetheless, out of the blue now the whole lot has turn into a matter of ‘concern’ for the ED and different businesses. ED and different businesses haven’t any enterprise to “examine” in respect of a property/properties acquired practically 20 years in the past,” Mr Raut mentioned.
Mr Raut claimed that 28 individuals have up to now been picked up and “wrongfully confined” by the probe businesses and have been threatened with dire penalties in the event that they don’t give statements towards him.
Pointing to the Prevention of Cash Laundering Act that was enacted in 2003, he alleged that the ED and different central businesses are threatening and harassing BJP’s political rivals through the use of the Act retrospectively with ulterior motive “within the garb of investigation” for decades-old transactions “that don’t have anything to do with any cash laundering” even when the Act can solely be utilized to transactions after 2003.
He claims that the probe businesses are summoning, intimidating and threatening the decorators and different distributors of the marriage occasion of his daughter final yr to extract a press release that they acquired Rs 50 lakhs in money.
“Ever since Shiv Sena parted methods with the BJP within the state of Maharashtra, we discover Shiv Sena MPs/ leaders being systematically focused through the use of legislation imposing businesses such because the Enforcement Directorate being let unfastened towards us and within the course of. Enforcement Directorate Personnel is leaving no stone unturned to intimidate/harass our legislators, MPs, political leaders in addition to their kinfolk, associates, and acquaintances,” Mr Raut added.
He mentioned that he was not scared and “is not going to bow down and can proceed to talk the reality”.
“I understand these makes an attempt by the Enforcement Directorate and different businesses as a direct assault on my proper to talk freely within the Home and out of doors the Home. I understand it to be an assault on our democracy I understand the current assaults on individuals recognized and unknown to me to have been occasioned on account of my refusal to partake in conspiring to topple the State Authorities in Maharashtra,” Mr Raut added.
He ended the letter with a well-liked poem by German pastor Martin Niemoller “who didn’t converse out towards the Nazi Rule on the proper time and wrote this confessional poem as a token of his remorse”.
