By A. Mirsab, TwoCircles.net,
Mumbai: “Tum kamal ka button dabaoge to vote mujhe hi jayega “ (When you press lotus button then the vote will only go to me) is the famous line of Narendra Modi during every of his rallies in Lok Sabha campaign and also during Maharashtra assembly election. Unfortunately, he is uttering the same line for criminally charged candidates too in his much debated controversial campaigning in Maharashtra.
While campaigning for Lok Sabha election he had surrounded all of his speeches around the corruption charges against Congress and other party leaders and had even vowed to jail such tainted politicians behind the bars if he was voted to power. Regrettably for the people who swung into his voluminous claims and made him PM, he has long forgotten his own words and is now asking people to vote for tainted politicians from his party.
Modi campaigns in Rahuri constituency of Maharashtra for tainted politician Shivaji Kardile (face circled) [Photo Courtesy : HT]
On Thursday he campaigned in Rahuri constituency of Ahmadnagar and urged people to vote for BJP candidate Shivaji Kardile against whom 12 criminal cases are registered including that of murder and extortion.
Ironically a day before Modi came down heavily on INC-NCP parties for encouraging criminalization of politics and said in his speech, “If they want (you) to vacate houses or shops, the bahubali (strongman) comes to your doorstep. The time has come to send these bahubalis to jail”.
The BJP candidate and a sitting MLA Kardile, who was on the stage with Modi on Thursday has already spent a year behind bars in 2002 for his role in the district cooperative bank scam. He was convicted for a year in the same case by Judicial Magistrate First Class (JMFC) M. S. Todkar in July of this year.
In 2011, he was booked for murder and subsequently for criminal intimidation, forgery and attempted murder in other cases. Kardile is also an accused in Ahmednagar’s Ashok Lande murder case, the trial of which is going on before Nashik District session court.
The difference in his declared assets between two elections shows rise of Rs. 14 Crores. He had declared Rs 2,33,52,407 in 2009 but for this election he has declared Rs 16,83,78,228 – a noteworthy growth.
This is second such politician to have been campaigned by PM Modi in Maharashtra. Two days before he campaigned for Kardile he promoted Anil Gote who has been charged under Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act 1999 (MCOC) in 2002 along with Adul Kareem Telgi in a multi-crore stamp scam and also spent months behind bars before he was granted bail.
Related:
BJP MLA in Maharashtra convicted for creating ruckus during DCC Bank election in Ahmednagar