MUMBAI: CM Devendra Fadnavis said in the assembly Tuesday that the woman arrested for trying to extort rural development minister Jaykumar Gore had been in direct touch with NCP (SP) MP Supriya Sule and MLA Rohit Pawar.
Fadnavis said the accused woman, her associate Tushar Kharat, a YouTuber who was also arrested, and a third arrested person had had hundreds of conversations with other politicians too from Sule and Pawar’s party. Later, Sule said that she was “surprised and amused” by Fadnavis’s statement.
Following allegations by CM Fadnavis in the Gore extortion case against Supriya Sule, she responded that she knew arrested YouTuber Tushar Kharat as a journalist who ran a popular YouTube channel and who had interviewed her during the Lok Sabha election.
“I would like to know what is wrong if a public representative is in touch with a journalist?” she said.
In the assembly, Pawar said he had raised the alleged harassment faced by the woman since he was a public representative. “We were told the woman and the journalist should get justice. We must have made one or two calls. Not hundreds of calls. Now the question is, will the govt investigate the allegations and all these proofs relating to a powerful person?” he said.
The 47-year-old woman from Satara was arrested in a trap laid last week where she was allegedly caught in the act of accepting Rs 1 crore, part of a Rs 3 crore demand she had allegedly made to Gore to not protest outside Raj Bhavan, the governor’s official residence, against alleged harassment by the minister.
Defending Gore, Fadnavis said if politics was being done with the intention of destroying someone’s life, then it was not right. He said the breach of privilege committee had become a toothless tiger and people were ridiculing and disrespecting the legislature and demeaning its status and constitutional position.
Pawar hit back, saying it was unfair that Gore’s breach of privilege motion against him was admitted and his breach of privilege motion against Gore was not heard. “The opposition should also have rights enshrined in the Constitution,” he said.
Sule said she was in touch with a lot of journalists, who sent her their stories and videos, and her “life and work are totally transparent”. She said she had only questioned the source of the money used to lay the trap for the arrest.
