NCP leader Eknath Khadse grilled by ED in land deal case

Mumbai, Jan 15 Senior Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)leader Eknath Khadse went to the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for questioning in a Pune MIDC land deal case, official sources said here on Friday.

Khadse, who has just recovered from Covid-19, arrived at the ED office in south Mumbai, nearly three weeks after he was first summoned in the alleged land-grab case.

Last month, a team of ED had gone to Pune to scrutinize evidences and gather documents pertaining to the alleged irregularities in the deal, which forced Khadse to quit as minister in the erstwhile BJP-led government in 2016.

Subsequently, the ED recorded the statement of the whistle-blower activist Anjali Damania in the matter in which she had moved the court.

Damania had also submitted documents and other evidences concerning the land deal which the State Anti Corruption Bureau had probed, given a clean chit to Khadse and later closed the case.

On his part, Khadse, 68 - who quit the BJP to join the NCP last October - has claimed innocence and said the entire transaction was absolutely transparent, and without any kind of irregularities.

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( With inputs from IANS )

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