Rattled by the allegations from NCP chief spokesperson Nawab Malik, the BJP demanded a probe by the Centre and the Uddhav Thackeray-led government in Maharashtra into the Minority Affairs Minister’s alleged “underworld links”.
While BJP’s Rajya Sabha member and legal expert Mahesh Jethmalani suggested an NIA probe, state BJP leader and former Education Minister Ashish Shelar urged the Maha Vikas Aghadi government to institute a probe.
The development comes a day after former Chief Minister and now Leader of Opposition Devendra Fadnavis spoke of Malik’s links to Sardar Shah Wali Khan and Mohammad Salim Ishaq Patel alias Salim Patel with whom his family had entered into a land deal at the LBS Marg in Kurla.
Both of them are linked to the syndicate controlled by Pakistan-based don Dawood Ibrahim, the mastermind of the 12 March 1993 serial blasts case.
Sardar Khan was a trusted man of Tiger Memon, the close aide of Dawood Ibrahim - and had been convicted and sentenced by a special TADA Court to life imprisonment, which had been confirmed by the Supreme Court in 2013.
Salim Patel was the frontman, bodyguard, and driver of Hasina Parkar, the late sister of Dawood Ibrahim, who carried out the land deals on behalf of her fugitive brother.
Jethmalani said, “Nawab Malik admits a property transaction with a 1993 bomb blast convict and an underworld Don but only defends the meagre price of the deal. He evades Fadnavis’ charge that the deal was to protect the land in question from seizure under TADA. NIA must step in.”
“Would Uddhav Thackeray ask for a probe against Malik?,” Shelar, a close aide of Fadnavis and an MLA, wanted to know.
BJP MLA Nitesh Rane stated, “A 1993 bomb blast criminal is Maharashtra cabinet minister’s business partner! Are we not playing with the innocent lives of people who are in danger of a similar attack. Is there a threat to Hindus again.”
It may be mentioned, after Fadnavis’s allegations, Malik admitted to the deal. “The deal in question was getting ownership rights as we were the tenants of a landlady of the Goawala Compound who had vested her Power of Attorney Salim Patel. Malik Sardar Shah Wali Khan was a convict in the March 1993 Mumbai serial bomb blasts, but we had no dealings with him. His father was a watchman in the compound and who entered his name wrongfully in the land records and is the father of Sardar Khan. We bought the rights from him. As for Salim Patel’s alleged links with Dawood Ibrahim or Hasina Parkar, as for us, he was the authorised Power of Attorney holder of the landlady…where is the question of purchasing the land from the underworld”.
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