Bombay HC seeks cooperative banks’ reply to Anna Hazare’s plea of ex-MLA fighting his case – India Today

The Bombay High Court has asked the cooperative banks to file a reply to the request made by Anna Hazare to implead former MLA Manik Jadhav as the second petitioner in the Maharashtra Cooperative Bank scam.

Anna Hazare’s plea says the former MLA was the one who had dug up all the dirt on the cooperative banks through RTIs, hence he was the right person to pursue the case on his behalf.

By Vidya : The Bombay High Court has asked the cooperative banks to file a reply to the request made by activist and RTI crusader Anna Hazare to implead former MLA Manik Jadhav as the second petitioner in the Maharashtra Cooperative Bank scam that he is pursuing.

When Hazare’s plea came up for hearing on Tuesday, his lawyer Satish Talekar told the bench of Acting Chief Justice (ACJ) SV Gangapurwala and Justice SG Chapalgaonkar that Hazare is now 84 and finds it difficult to individually pursue the petitions against the cooperative banks scam.

Advocate Joel Carlos appearing for one of the cooperative banks from Pune, however, objected to Jadhav being impleaded. He stated that when Hazare had filed the PIL, he had gone through the rigors that a PIL petitioner goes through. But Jadhav cannot be allowed to circumvent that and will have to show his bonafide before being added as a petitioner.

Carlos further alleged that when Hazare filed the PIL in the cooperative bank scam, the octogenarian had “suppressed a lot of information that he had.”

To which the bench replied, “This will come up when the PIL is to be considered on merits. As of now, we are not considering it on merit.”

The court asked the replies to be filed and said that it will further hear Hazare’s request on January 17, 2023.

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Maharashtra Cooperative Bank scam

An FIR was registered in the Maharashtra State Cooperative (MSC) Bank scam of allegedly worth Rs 25,000 crore and an investigation on the same is ongoing. NCP leader and former deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar is one of the 75 accused in the case. None of the accused in the case were arrested by the investigating agency.

Hazare’s plea stated that Jadhav has been closely associated with the cooperative sector and was the president of the Maharashtra Rajya Sakhar Kamgar Mahasangh from 1975 to 2005. Even now, 68-year-old Jadhav is said to be president of 26 workers’ unions of various cooperative sugar mills.

The plea further claimed that Jadhav had obtained a lot of information under the Right to Information (RTI) Act about the “illegal sale of cooperative sugar factories by politicians who not only held portfolios of the cooperative department, but held key positions in the Maharashtra State Cooperative Bank, the District Central Cooperative Banks and in various Apex bodies of the sugar industry.”

Hazare’s plea stayed that Jadhav has been closely associated with the Cooperative sector and is well aware of the facts and circumstances. Hazare said that he himself is unwell and the circumstances have gone beyond his control and he is unable to prosecute the plea in the best possible and effective manner.