By IANS,
Mumbai: Reiterating that he had no role to play in the Adarsh Housing Society scam, former Maharashtra chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh Wednesday shifted the blame on two of his ministerial colleagues, Ashok Chavan and Jayant Patel.
Deshmukh, who appeared before the two-member commission investigating the scam related to irregularities in allotment of flats in the Adarsh housing society, originally intended for Kargil martyrs, put the blame on Chavan, another former chief minister who was then revenue minister, and Patel, who was then finance minister.
Deshmukh said he had signed the files related to the society only after it had been cleared by the two ministers.
Deshmukh, who is now union science and technology minister, was grilled for the second day by the two-member judicial commission of Justice (retd.) J.A. Patil and former state chief secretary P. Subrahmanyam.
On Tuesday, Deshmukh told the commission he had cleared the relevant files regarding the Adarsh society as senior bureaucrats had already checked them.
On Monday, the commission had questioned Sushilkumar Shinde, another former Maharashtra chief minister and now union power minister.
Shinde had claimed that the decision to allot government land and grant additional FSI (floor space index) to Adarsh Housing Society was taken during the tenure of Deshmukh.
The two-member judicial commission investigating the Adarsh society scam is currently hearing what the three former chief ministers have to say on how clearances to Adarsh society were given.
Chavan will depose before the commission June 30.
The Adarsh scam involves a prime plot of land in south Mumbai’s Colaba locality, on which a 31-storey building was constructed by the society.