Assam Congress MLA arranged Assembly car passes for ‘most wanted’ car thief

In the first instance, when the pass was issued on May 18, 2013, legislator Nath had shown Anil Chauhan as driver of a vehicle (AS-01MA-5917) of which she claimed she was the owner. On September 26, 2014, the Assembly issued a pass against the same vehicle when Nath showed Anil Chauhan as its owner and one Milan Rabha as its driver. On January 29 this year, a pass was issued for the same vehicle, again showing Chauhan as owner and one Mili Rabha as driver, Assembly secretariat sources said.

According to rules, an MLA or minister can get passes for all of his or her vehicles, apart from recommending issue of passes for five more vehicles for his or her family members, friends and relatives. Anil Chauhan, said to be “the country’s most-wanted car-lifter” and who was earlier arrested in Meghalaya in August 2010, is said to have been involved in the theft of at least 3,000 cars across the country.

The Guwahati Police had, in a joint operation with the CRPF, arrested Chauhan from near Azara in west Guwahati on Friday night and recovered from him one hand-made pistol, one 9mm pistol, some ammunitions, four mobile phones and four ATM cards. According to the police, Chauhan is wanted in numerous cases of car-lifting in New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Shillong, Maharashtra and other places and his network is spread over the entire country. Police have also claimed that Chauhan, who owns apartments and houses in several localities in Guwahati city, is also involved in smuggling of animal parts and illegal weapons.

Rumi Nath, who was first elected to the state assembly on a BJP ticket from Barkhola constituency in 2006 joined the Congress in 2010 to be elected as Congress MLA in 2011. A year later she first hit headlines by leaving her doctor husband Rakesh Singh and a two-year old daughter to convert into Islam and marry a departmental MLA called Jackie Zakir. In April last year she made news again when she filed a complaint against Zakir of domestic violence and torture and got him arrested.