ACB directed to probe Kashinath Shetye’s plaint
TEAM HERALD
MARGAO: South Goa Principal Sessions Judge, Nutan Sardesai on Wednesday disposed of a petition filed by RTI activist Kashinath Shetye against Power Minister Milind Naik with a direction to the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) to conduct a preliminary inquiry into the complaint filed by the activist against the minister.
The RTI activist had accused the Power Minister for malpractice, corruption and influencing his voters from Vasco. Shetye had approached ACB Police Inspector with a complaint against the Power Minister, but the ACB had declined to file an FIR. Aggrieved by the refusal of the ACB as well as the district police chief south to register the FIR, Shetye had knocked the doors of the Sessions Court under section 156(2) of Cr PC praying for directions to the ACB to register FIR against the Power Minister.
Shetye’s contention was that on April 3, 2013, on the final day of the SSC exams, when hot mixing of road was in progress in Vasco there was a traffic jam and students from the city could not reach their respective exam centers in time. Power Minister Naik, who is also the Vasco MLA, later intervened and contacted the Chairman of the Board of Exams and requested to grant Vasco students extra half an hour to answer the paper on the day.
In his complaint to the ACB, Shetye claimed that the decision to grant half an hour to students from Vasco to answer the exam amounted to corruption and that this facility could not be availed by other students in the state of Goa. He also claimed that by granting extra time, the local MLA was trying to influence his voters.
Earlier during arguments, Public Prosecutor Sarojini Sardinha had argued that influencing voters by the Minister did not arise since Shetye had nowhere in the complaint stated that Milind Naik had connived with the PWD to hot mix the road in Vasco.
