Mumbai: National Congress Party (NCP) leader Chhagan Bhujbal’s bail plea was today rejected by the Bombay High Court. Bhujbal, who has been arrested in a money laundering case, told the High Court on Tuesday that he is suffering from a critical heart ailment and thus needed bail for treatment.
Bhujbal approached the HC seeking bail considering his medical condition after a special PMLA court rejected his bail plea. Senior counsel Amit Desai, appearing for Bhujbal, argued that the 69-year-old NCP leader was suffering from a terminal illness which needs immediate and a specific line of treatment.
He added that since past 25 years, Bhujbal has also been suffering from various other ailments like diabetes, bronchal asthma, hyper-tension and has also undergone surgeries for heart ailments.
Bhujbal, who was arrested on March 14 by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for alleged money laundering, was admitted to the St George hospital here on March 18 after he fell sick in Arthur Road prison. He was discharged after a week.
The ACB, in February this year, had chargesheeted 17 persons, including the Bhujbals in connection with the Maharashtra Sadan case.
It had filed a 20,000-page chargesheet consisting of statements of over 60 witnesses.
According to the anti-graft agency, the case was entirely based on documentary evidence, such as fund transfer and bank transactions.
In the construction of Maharashtra Sadan, contractors have earned 80 per cent profits, while as per the government circular such contractors are entitled to only 20 per cent gains, the officials said.
They added that the books of accounts were fudged to show that the profit earned was only one per cent.
Officials had said that to construct Maharashtra Sadan, Chamankar Associates, the contractor firm, had allegedly transferred money to Niche Infrastructure and other companies in which Pankaj and Sameer were the directors.
The chargesheet said that most of the companies floated by the Bhujbals are in the name of employees and used for siphoning off funds.
Niche was earlier owned by some employees of Maharashtra Educational Trust, in which the Bhujbals later became directors.
(With inputs from PTI)
