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Uddhav Sena accuses NCP MLA Sunil Shelke of mining royalty evasion worth thousands of crores of rupees

Shiv Sena (UBT) spokesperson Sanjay Raut wrote to Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, seeking action against alleged royalty evasion by Sunil Shelke.

Maval seat, Mahayuti alliance partner, Bala Bhegde, Maval assembly seat, MLA Sunil Shelke, Ajit Pawar faction, BJP, NCP, Indian express newsMaval sitting MLA Sunil Shelke (File Photo)

The Shiv Sena (UBT) Wednesday alleged that Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) MLA Sunil Shelke has caused a loss worth thousands of crores of rupees to the state exchequer by not paying the royalty for quarrying activities in his constituency, Maval. In a letter to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, Sena (UBT) spokesperson Sanjay Raut urged him to stop the blatant ‘loot’ by the MLA belonging to Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar’s NCP.

”Sunil Shelke, without taking any permission from the government, has indulged in digging and collecting minerals from quarries. However, he has failed to pay any royalty to the government,” Raut alleged, adding that Shelke has cheated the government.

As per the Maharashtra Minor Mineral Extraction (Development and Regulation) Rules, 2013, every lessee is required to pay royalty on minerals such as sand, gravel, and murrum mined from the leased area at rates specified by the government from time to time.

Raut said Shelke and his brother had made an application in 2023 to the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) to receive land compensation for the land acquired by the government. ”Accordingly, they were given an alternative land in return,” he said.

”Since Shelke has deprived the government of royalty worth thousands of crores (of rupees), how is the government going to compensate for it? The chief minister should issue a directive in this regard,” Raut said.

“The government has several times acquired fertile and irrigated land from farmers. But has never compensated them with a piece of land in return. Why were the MLA and his family then given the land as compensation?” asked Raut.

Shelke, who is attending the Monsoon Session of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly, has not responded to Raut’s allegations.

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Shelke won from Maval for the first time in the 2019 polls as part of the undivided NCP, defeating two-time BJP MLA Bala Bhegade. He retained the seat in the 2024 Maharashtra Assembly polls, beating the nearest rival, Bapu Jaywantrao Bhegade, who contested as an Independent.

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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