MUMBAI/PUNE/NAGPUR: Election heat in Maharashtra went up a notch on Saturday with former cop Sachin Waze revealing that he had named another minister from the MVA govt – Jayant Patil – in his purported missive to deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis on the orchestra bars extortion case involving former home minister Anil Deshmukh.
The revelations by Waze, currently in jail in a murder case, triggered a fresh war of words between BJP & NCP(SP).
Waze said that in his letter addressed to BJP’s Fadnavis, he has mentioned Patil’s name. Meanwhile, speaking to media in Nagpur, Fadnavis said, “I haven’t read Waze’s letter. I learnt about it through media reports. If Waze indeed sent such a letter, its authenticity will be verified, and an investigation will follow.”
NCP-SP’s Jayant Patil said, “Nowadays, a person in jail is also giving an interview. There are serious allegations against him (Waze), I don’t think I need to reply to him.” Waze spoke to the media on Friday when a police team was escorting him from court to jail. The case recently made it back to the news after Deshmukh claimed that Fadnavis had attempted to pressure him into filing false affidavits against Uddhav Thackeray, his son Aaditya, then deputy CM Ajit Pawar, and former minister Anil Parab three years ago.
In 2021, during the tenure of the MVA govt led by Thackeray, the then Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh had alleged that then home minister Anil Deshmukh had asked Waze to collect Rs 100 crore from orchestra bars in Mumbai for him. Singh had made the allegation after Deshmukh shunted him from the police commissioner’s post following the Antilia bomb scare and the Mansukh Hiran murder case controversy, which led to Waze’s arrest in the case by NIA.
In Nagpur, Deshmukh, after sharing the dias with Fadnavis at the inauguration of the state planning commission building on Saturday, denied these accusations, pointing out that Bombay high court had granted him bail and explicitly stated that Waze’s testimony was unreliable due to his criminal background. Deshmukh also questioned Fadnavis’s judgment in using Waze’s claims against him. The former home minister went on to accuse Fadnavis of orchestrating the plot in retaliation to his recent expose.
NCP-SP MP Supriya Sule questioned the timing of Waze’s statement, with the assembly election in the state approaching, and said, “Which Jayant Patil he is talking about we don’t know… dirty politics being played out in Maharashtra. See the timing of the letter, why he is writing it now because they (the ruling party) are afraid of our senior leader, so they are now behind them.”
The revelations by Waze, currently in jail in a murder case, triggered a fresh war of words between BJP & NCP(SP).
Waze said that in his letter addressed to BJP’s Fadnavis, he has mentioned Patil’s name. Meanwhile, speaking to media in Nagpur, Fadnavis said, “I haven’t read Waze’s letter. I learnt about it through media reports. If Waze indeed sent such a letter, its authenticity will be verified, and an investigation will follow.”
NCP-SP’s Jayant Patil said, “Nowadays, a person in jail is also giving an interview. There are serious allegations against him (Waze), I don’t think I need to reply to him.” Waze spoke to the media on Friday when a police team was escorting him from court to jail. The case recently made it back to the news after Deshmukh claimed that Fadnavis had attempted to pressure him into filing false affidavits against Uddhav Thackeray, his son Aaditya, then deputy CM Ajit Pawar, and former minister Anil Parab three years ago.
In 2021, during the tenure of the MVA govt led by Thackeray, the then Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh had alleged that then home minister Anil Deshmukh had asked Waze to collect Rs 100 crore from orchestra bars in Mumbai for him. Singh had made the allegation after Deshmukh shunted him from the police commissioner’s post following the Antilia bomb scare and the Mansukh Hiran murder case controversy, which led to Waze’s arrest in the case by NIA.
In Nagpur, Deshmukh, after sharing the dias with Fadnavis at the inauguration of the state planning commission building on Saturday, denied these accusations, pointing out that Bombay high court had granted him bail and explicitly stated that Waze’s testimony was unreliable due to his criminal background. Deshmukh also questioned Fadnavis’s judgment in using Waze’s claims against him. The former home minister went on to accuse Fadnavis of orchestrating the plot in retaliation to his recent expose.
NCP-SP MP Supriya Sule questioned the timing of Waze’s statement, with the assembly election in the state approaching, and said, “Which Jayant Patil he is talking about we don’t know… dirty politics being played out in Maharashtra. See the timing of the letter, why he is writing it now because they (the ruling party) are afraid of our senior leader, so they are now behind them.”