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Journalism of Courage
With questions being raised on Vasundhara Raje’s ties with Lalit Modi, former CM Ashok Gehlot, who took over after Raje in 2008, speaks about the irregularities he had found and complaints from bureaucrats against Modi.
After you took charge as CM in 2008, what irregularities did you find in the previous Raje government?
There were so many… Land acquisition for the Knowledge and IT corridors was riddled with holes, 90B was a very popular clause then where everyone knew how corrupt land conversion had become, Dalits land near the Dholpur Palace was illegally taken away… Then there was the Deen Dayal Upadhyay Trust. It was a unique case in which land was allotted to a trust which did not even exist and the membership was hereditary… Havelis were illegally allotted to Modi. There were so many cases that we had to form the Mathur Commission to look into them.
Why did the NN Mathur Commission not achieve anything?
The commission was formed not with a sense of political vendetta but to see what went wrong with the previous government. We could have learnt from their mistakes too. So all the cases against the Raje government were given to Mathur Commission to investigate. But call it my mistake or whatever, we did not go through the assembly and Commission of Inquiry Act and it was dismissed by the HC and SC.
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How did you stumble upon the haveli controversy?
We found that two havelis in Amber were sold to Minal Modi and Lalit Modi. So we set up an inquiry. Those havelis were owned by the government and in no way could they be sold. What might have happened is, the previous government must have vacated it because of encroachers and sold it to Modi at throwaway prices. We seized both the havelis but the interesting fact was that no one dared to come back and claim its possession. It has since been locked up and with the state government.
It is said that Lalit Modi humiliated bureaucrats. Did they speak to you about it?
There is nothing new in that. So many IAS and IPS officers were abused and humiliated by Lalit Modi. They would have to go running to Rambagh Palace Hotel for meetings and attend to his beck and call. Even for transfer postings they would have to run to Modi. Several IAS and IPS officers complained to me then and after.
Charges have been levelled against your son Vaibhav Gehlot too regarding dubious financial dealings…
I have said this earlier also when allegations were made against Robert Vadra’s land deals that there should be a probe by a HC or SC judge into all the allegations against Vadra, my son Vaibhav and Raje’s son Dushyant Singh. I stick to my words.
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