ED gets 6 days custody of former minister Nagendra in Valmiki Corporation scam case

BENGALURU: A Bengaluru court on Saturday granted custody of former Minister B Nagendra to the Enforcement Directorate (ED) till July 18 in connection with the alleged Valmiki Corporation Scam.

The Enforcement Directorate (ED), earlier in the day, arrested Nagendra in connection with the alleged multi-crore scam case. Soon after the arrest, he was produced before the court in Bengaluru.

Nagendra coming out of the judge’s residence in Bengaluru on Saturday.

On Friday, the ED detained the former minister after raids by the central agency at many places on Wednesday linked to Nagendra and MLA Basanagouda Daddal in connection with the alleged embezzlement of funds in Valmiki Development Corporation.

The corruption case of Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation came to light after an official of the Corporation died by suicide and left a note containing an allegation of multi-crore corruption in the corporation.

Nagendra was earlier taken to Bowring Hospital for a medical check-up.

The official identified as Chandrasekaran (45), a resident of the Kenchappa colony in Vinobanagar, allegedly died by suicide on May 26 after leaving a note containing an allegation of multi-crore corruption in the corporation. Chandrasekaran was a superintendent with the MVDC 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.

Chandrasekaran had left behind a six-page death note alleging corruption by senior officers.

On June 6, Nagendra said that he has voluntarily decided to resign as an investigation is going on over the allegations of illegal money transfer from Karnataka Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation Ltd. The former Minister 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 Karnataka 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 was 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 Bellary. The Karnataka CM is involved in this so we demand the resignation of Siddaramaiah. He should resign and face the probe then only 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 crores from bank to companies.”

On the Enforcement Directorate raids in the Valmiki Development 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. 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 for how it can be done, not on NR Ramesh or somebody’s complaint ED can do an investigation”, he added. (With Agency inputs)