Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) MP Sanjay Raut praised the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and will also be meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah in a few days. He stepped out of jail on Wednesday evening after a special court in Mumbai granted him bail in a money laundering case related to the Patra Chawl redevelopment project. He was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on August 1 this year.
"I will meet Uddhav Thackeray. NCP chief Sharad Pawar also called me. I do not have any complaints regarding anybody. We have not seen such political vendetta. I will not blame any central agencies," he said.
Praising the Eknath Shinde-BJP government in Maharashtra, Raut said, "I welcome some of their good decisions. Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadanvis took some good decisions. We feel that Fadnavis is running the state."
He will also meet Fadnavis in a week.
Raut, a close confidante of Thackeray, left the Arthur Road jail in central Mumbai 100 days after his arrest under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act. In the detailed order, the special Prevention of Money Laundering Act court said Raut's arrest was "illegal" and a "witch-hunt".
The ED's probe pertained to alleged financial irregularities in the redevelopment of the Patra Chawl and related financial transactions involving Raut's wife and associates. Siddharth Nagar, popularly known as the Patra Chawl, in Goregaon, is spread over 47 acres and houses 672 tenant families.
In 2008, MHADA, a government agency, assigned a redevelopment contract for the Chawl to Guru Ashish Construction Private Limited (GACPL), a sister company of Housing Development and Infrastructure Ltd (HDIL). The GACPL was supposed to build 672 flats for the tenants and give some flats to MHADA. It was free to sell the remaining land to private developers.
But the tenants did not get a single flat in the last 14 years as the company did not redevelop the Patra Chawl and sold land parcels and Floor Space Index (FSI) to other builders for Rs 1,034 crore, as per the ED played a major role in the money laundering case.
With inputs from PTI
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