Social activist Anjali Damania said here on Friday that she will fight Dhananjay Munde in the Supreme Court after he got a relief from the Bombay High Court. She also demanded that Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis should not take Munde back into his cabinet.
In a relief to the former Ajit Pawar-led NCP minister on Thursday evening, the high court ruled that procurements made by the Agriculture Department during his tenure are in accordance with rules. The court quashed the allegations of an alleged scam in the procurement of agricultural materials against Dhananjay Munde.
During his tenure as the agriculture minister, some petitions claiming irregularities and changes in the agricultural materials procurement policy were filed. It was alleged that the department spent more by discontinuing the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) scheme and purchasing agricultural materials. The petitioners also claimed that some agricultural pumps were purchased at a price higher than the market rate.
However, Anjali Damania said, “I will present what I think are the flaws in it. We will now take this matter to the Supreme Court. The government lawyers told the court that the two government resolutions (GRs) were from different departments. Everything that the lawyers presented is wrong”.
“Corruption was not even mentioned anywhere in these cases. The corruption angle has not been presented anywhere. Due to this, Dhananjay Munde has not been given a clean chit. This entire matter needs to be challenged in the Supreme Court. The report of V Radha, who was the secretary of the department, was never presented and instead, she was hastily transferred. The secretary told me eight times all that happened,” Anjali Damania said.
Anjali Damania also demanded that Fadnavis should not reinstate Dhananjay Munde to the cabinet. “It is unfortunate for Maharashtra that first Dhananjay Munde and then Manikrao Kokate became agriculture ministers. Due to the wrong presentation by petitioners and the confusion of government lawyers, everything went the wrong way,” she said.