Khadse didn’t know wife, son-in-law bought plot

MUMBAI: The anti-corruption bureau’s (ACB) clean chit to former revenue minister Eknath Khadse last month, in the controversial Bhosari land deal near Pune, primarily rests on the claim that there was no evidence to prove Khadse was aware of his wife, Mandakini, and his son-inlaw Girish Choudhary, buying the three-acre plot, said the agency’s investigative report, which HT has accessed.

The complainant in the case, Hemant Gawande, has called the ACB’S report and findings ludicrous, and said he was in the process of filing a protest petition.

The controversy pertains to the purchase of the plot in Bhosari, near Pune, by Khadse’s kin for ₹3.75 crore, against the prevalent market rate of

₹30 crore. Khadse, who was the revenue minister, had to step down after investigations began into the alleged graft and conflict of interest in 2016. In April 2018, the ACB had given him a clean chit in the case.

In its report, the ACB also uled out the conflict of interest charges against Khadse — over a meeting he had held with industry and reveofficials nue about paying the original

owner of the plot compensation — because he had scrapped the minutes of this meeting later and the directives he issued were not implemented.

While the ACB, in its report said that it could not be conclusively proven that the former minister had indulged in impropriety or irregularity in the land deal, it has admitted that the meeting Khadse had held on April 12, 2016 about the compensation was suspicious.

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