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‘Deal under cloud’: Raju Shetti demands action from Union MoS Murlidhar Mohol to cancel Pune Jain trust land sale

Challenging the sale of a prime property belonging to a Jain trust in Pune’s Model Colony area, farmer leader Raju Shetti has raised allegations of irregularities in the deal, and has vowed to keep fighting till it is cancelled.

It’s the first victory in our fight to stop the sale of the prime property which has a lot of significance for the Jain community and its students, says Raju Shetti.

Farmer leader Raju Shetti, who has taken up the cudgels against the sale of a prime property that houses a Jain boarding hostel, a Jain temple, and other facilities in Pune’s Model Colony, states in an interview with Manoj More that he will not rest till the sale transaction is cancelled.

The controversy began after trustees of the Seth Hirachand Nemachand Samarak Trust recently negotiated a land deal over the 3.5-acre plot with Gokhale Constructions. While the Jain community has demanded the cancellation of the deal, the trustees have reportedly justified the sale, citing financial constraints.

Excerpt from the interview:

The Charity Commissioner’s Office in Mumbai has ordered status quo with regard to the Jain trust property’s sale in Model Colony. What do you have to say about it?

Raju Shetti: It’s the first victory in our fight to stop the sale of the prime property which has a lot of significance for the Jain community and its students. But it is not the final victory. We will wait till the Bombay High Court cancels the sale transaction between the trust and the builder.

You have alleged that Pune MP and Union Minister of State for Civil Aviation Murlidhar Mohol is involved in the deal. Are your allegations politically motivated?

Raju Shetti: No, there is no politics in this. I have come forward to help former students and the Jain community to get justice, especially since it involves the issue of their faith. The trust has gone to the extent of even selling the temple.

But minister Murlidhar Mohol has alleged that your allegations are baseless.

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Raju Shetti: If my allegations were baseless, why would the Charity Commissioner’s Office order status quo? It has also found something wrong with the deal. It has clearly said that the trust misled it regarding the presence of the Jain temple on the 3.5-acre premises…

Before entering into this controversy, I studied the issue thoroughly. I have gone through all the transactions relating to the sale as well as how the loan was procured and how even the temple land was mortgaged. If my allegations were false, then why was the mortgaged deed withdrawn by the credit societies which gave a loan of Rs 70 crore to the builders? Just two days ago, the two credit societies asked the builders to submit another property as a mortgage.

How much loan was taken and from which banks?

Raju Shetti: As per the documents I have gone through, the loan of Rs 70 crore has been raised from two credit societies. What is shocking is that the same day the sale deed was finalised, the mortgage deed was also done. Actually, after the sale deed is signed, the mortgage deed takes at least 15 days to be finalised. In this case, the mortgage deed was done on the same day.

As per my information, one loan was raised from a credit society in Karnataka. When there are so many credit societies in Pune, why did the builders approach a credit society in Karnataka? This is because the chairman of the society is a BJP leader whose wife was also a minister in the Karnataka government. The credit society in Buldhana, where another loan was raised, is also linked to a BJP leader.

So what are you hinting at?

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Raju Shetti: This is a deal that is completely under a cloud. There are a lot of people involved in it, including big players. The builders had purchased the property for some Rs 310 crore, and they had stated at a press conference in May that they would be earning a revenue of Rs 3,000 crore from the property.

Are you demanding the minister’s resignation?

Raju Shetti: Murlidhar Mohol is a local MP. If he says he is not involved in the deal, then he should take the initiative to cancel the deal… As of now, we are waiting for him to announce the cancellation of the deal. I have heard that he might take steps towards this. And therefore, I am not demanding his resignation. If the deal is cancelled, we have no issues. The Jain community and the students should get justice.

Mohol has claimed that he had quit partnership with the builders 11 months ago and therefore he was in no way involved with the deal.

Raju Shetti: Remember, he did not quit on his own. He had to quit because he became a minister. A minister cannot hold an office of profit. But he has used his good contacts to see the deal through. Just resigning from a partnership does not mean that he had severed ties with the builders.

Manoj Dattatrye More

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades. Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died. Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More

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