BENGALURU: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday detained former ST Welfare Minister B Nagendra in connection with the alleged scam in the Maharshi Valmiki ST Development Corporation.
The development comes after ED conducted raids at many places on Wednesday linked to former Nagendra and Congress MLA and Corporation chairman Basanagouda Daddal in connection with the alleged embezzlement of funds in the Valmiki Development Corporation.
On June 6, Nagendra said that he has voluntarily decided to resign as an investigation by the state SIT was going on into the allegations of illegal money transfer from the Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation Ltd. Nagendra had dismissed all the allegations against him and said that he’d come out clean after the investigation.
On Thursday, Union Minister and BJP MP Shobha Karandlaje alleged that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was involved in the Valmiki Development Corporation scam and demanded his resignation.
Shobha Karandlaje said, “On July 3, I wrote to the Union Home Minister and demanded a CBI probe into this. When the CBI probe is going on, the Karnataka government formed an SIT to hide this scam. Now the SIT is not helping the CBI, but the probe is going on and the ED conducted raids. At various places, searches are being conducted in Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Ballari. The Karnataka CM is involved in this, so we demand the resignation of Siddaramaiah. He should resign and face the probe, only then justice will be delivered”.
She further said, “Siddaramaiah is the Finance Minister. Without his instructions, no one will have the courage to transfer Rs 187 crore from a bank to private companies”.
On the Enforcement Directorate raids in the Valmiki Corporation case, Deputy CM DK Shivakumar said that there was no need for the ED raid. “There was no need to ED raid. Our SIT officers have already done an investigation and money has been recovered. The CBI have already filed an FIR and they have provisions to take up the investigation, ED doesn’t have that provision. There is a procedure how it can be done, ED can’t take up investigation on N R Ramesh or somebody’s complaint”, he added.
The corruption case in the Corporation came to light after an official died by suicide and left a note mentioning a multi-crore corruption in the corporation. The official, identified as Chandrasekaran (45), a resident of the Kenchappa colony in Vinoba Nagar in Shivamogga, allegedly died by suicide on May 26.
Chandrasekaran was a superintendent with the MVSTDC and was posted at its Bengaluru office. In a six-page suicide note recovered by police, Chandrasekaran mentioned the names of three officials and alleged corruption worth crores in the corporation, demanding action against the named officials. (With Agency Inputs)