Congress MLAs hold protest outside Madhya Pradesh assembly demanding probe in transport dept ex-constable corruption case

Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh) [India], March 13 (ANI): Madhya Pradesh Congress MLAs on Thursday, the fourth day of the Budget Session, staged another protest in front of the Mahatma Gandhi statue on the premises of the State Assembly and demanded a probe into a corruption case related to the former constable of the State Transport Department.
The Congress MLAs, including Leader of Opposition (LoP) Umang Singhar dressed in black T shirts that had a sketch of a skeleton imprinted on them and carrying symbolic gold coloured bricks in their hands raised slogans demanding fair investigation of the case.
LoP Singhar told ANI, "The symbolic getup shows that the State has become a skeleton and is deep in debt. The bricks represents the gold which is being recovered from officials and employees (referring to ex transport constable's corruption case). Be it minister Govind Singh Rajput, former minister and BJP MLA Bhupendra Singh and one Sanjay Shrivastva, I want to say that the State government has proof in connection with the case but why does the government not want to investigate the matter. CM Mohan Yadav, are you afraid of these people? I want to understand, is minister Rajput higher than you?"
The Congress leader further said that if the State government was supporting corruption, then it was a matter of sadness for the people of the state.
"Gold bricks were recovered (referring to gold recovered from abandoned car in Bhopal), the Chief Minister should tell us whose brick it is. Does it belong to Minister Govind Rajput or Sanjay Srivastava or others," Singhar asked.
Another Congress MLA Vivek Vicky Patel said, "Today, the State is deep in debt while the ministers of the state are getting richer. We demand that an inquiry should be conducted to investigate the transport department scam. Where did this gold come from? We want an inquiry into the matter."
Madhya Pradesh Lokayukta police has registered a case against the former constable of State Transport Department Saurabh Sharma under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 and conducted searches at different locations uncovering assets suspected to be disproportionate to Sharma's known sources of income.
Later on, the Lokayukta police arrested Sharma, his associates Chetan Singh Gaur and Sharad Jaiswal and produced them before the court from where they were sent to jail.
Earlier on December 19 and 20 last year, the Lokayukta recovered assets worth several crores from two residences linked to the accused, located at E-7/78 and E-7/657 in Arera Colony, Bhopal.
In a related development, Bhopal police and Income Tax (IT) officials recovered 52 kg of gold worth over Rs 40 crore and Rs 9.86 crore in cash from an abandoned car. The car was registered under the name of Chetan Singh Gaur and was discovered late at night on December 19 last year near Mendori-Kushalpur Road under Ratibad police station limits. Upon receiving information, officials seized the car and its contents. (ANI)