NCP's Eknath Khadse grilled by ED for over 8 hours

Mumbai, July 8 Senior Nationalist Congress Party leader Eknath Khadse was grilled by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for over 8 hours before he was allowed to go home late on Thursday.

Emerging from the ED office, he got into his SUV without interacting with the waiting media persons and it was not clear whether he will be summoned again for probe in the alleged corruption cases against him.

"The case against me is politically motivated. My and family members and I are being targeted politically to defame us. However, I am cooperating fully with the probe agencies," said Khadse this morning, before going to the ED office for the probe into the Pune land deal case.

The ED summoned Khadse, 68, for the second round of probe - a day after arresting his son-in-law Girish Chaudhary in connection with the alleged money-laundering and other irregularities in the purchase of a plot of land in 2016.

Khadse added that entire Maharashtra is witnessing what is going on, as the case has already been probed five times, the Anti-Corruption Bureau had given him a clean chit, yet it is being investigated again.

The ED has contended that Khadse and Chaudhary had bought the government-owned plot at Bhosari near Pune for Rs 3.75 crore against the prevailing market rate of over Rs 31 crore.

The agency also suspects that Khadse, as the then Revenue Minister in the BJP-led government, had reportedly misused his official position to force the officials concerned officials on the transaction for his family, and contended that the source of funds for the deal was not genuine as the money had been routed through shell companies.

A former de-facto No 2 in the state government, Khadse, a former Bharatiya Janata Party minister, was shunted to the political wilderness for almost five years following political differences with the then Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, and he joined the NCP in October 2020.

"I left the BJP and joined the NCP, that's why I am being harassed like this. It's a political conspiracy," Khadse hit out in a brief interaction with the media outside the ED office.

Meanwhile, after intensive interrogation on Wednesday, Chaudhary was produced before a special PMLA court in Mumbai which sent him to the ED's custody.

Khadse is the second prominent NCP leader besides former Home Minister Anil Deshmukh and his family facing the ED heat for alleged corruption.

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