Non-disclosure of criminal cases in poll affidavit: Nagpur court acquits Devendra Fadnavis

Devendra Fadnavis/ File Photo

A local court in Nagpur on Friday held Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis not guilty in connection to a complaint accusing the BJP leader of not disclosing criminal cases pending against him in his poll affidavit of the 2014 assembly elections, stated a PTI report.

The Civil Judge SS Jadhav said that the court had acquitted Fadnavis, who was present in the courtroom virtually.

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Reportedly, an advocate, Satish Uke, had filed an application seeking criminal proceedings against Fadnavis alleging that cases of cheating and forgery had been registered against the BJP leader in 1996 and 1998 and that the latter did not disclose this information in his poll affidavit.

According to the PTI report, Fadnavis, in an earlier statement to the court, had admitted that there had been an inadvertent mistake on the part of his lawyer while collating information about pending criminal cases against him due to which two criminal cases were not mentioned in his election affidavit submitted in 2014.

In his statement dated April 15, Fadnavis had said that the information about the two "insignificant" complaint cases and their non-inclusion in the affidavit of Form 26 was "sheer inadvertence and without any intention", stated the PTI report.

Devendra Fadnavis, reportedly, further claimed that he had mentioned cases of a more severe nature in his election affidavit. The BJP leader, elected from the Nagpur South West assembly constituency, further stated that he has been the Assembly's sitting member since 1999 and had won by a huge margin each time.

Reportedly, Fadnavis had appeared before the court on two occasions to record his statement.

Meanwhile, Uke is presently lodged in jail after being arrested by the Enforcement Directorate on charges of money laundering. He was recently charged under the stringent Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) in connection with a land grab case.

The case pertains to the alleged illicit takeover of 4,100 square metres of land owned by the Nagpur Improvement Trust (NIT) in Mouza Babulkheda. Uke and other accused are facing charges of cheating and criminal conspiracy. A probe, reportedly, revealed that Uke and his associates, including his brother, orchestrated the land grab using fraudulent documents.