Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren with JMM MLAs waves after paying tribute to Mahatma Gandhi on his death anniversary, in Ranchi
Credit: PTI Photo
New Delhi: Breaking suspense over his whereabouts, Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren on Tuesday chaired a meeting of ruling alliance's MLAs at his official residence even as he is all set to record his statement before Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case.
Soren had already told the ED that its investigators could record his statement on January 31 at his Ranchi residence. The ED sources said they have recovered Rs 36 lakh in cash and a luxury car from his Delhi residence where the investigators stayed for around 13 hours on Monday to question him.
With the ED claiming that he is "missing" as they could not locate him in Delhi, Soren was seen at his official residence on Tuesday where he held a meeting with MLAs before going to Bapu Vatika, a local park, to pay tributes to Mahatma Gandhi on his death anniversary. At the meeting, Soren's wife Kalpana was also present.
"I reside in your hearts...We all are committed to following the footsteps and ideologies of the Father of the Nation. We are proud that such people were born among us and guided us," Soren told reporters in Ranchi.
Soren had left for Delhi on January 27 after cancelling his scheduled programmes in the state. He had in an email to the ED alleged that the agency's actions were "motivated by political agenda" to disrupt the state government's functioning and claimed that its insistence to record his statement again on or before January 31 "reeked of malice".
He had also demanded that the ED should preserve video recording of seven-hour questioning on January 20 to make available to the court of law.
JMM spokesperson Supriyo Bhattacharya asked, "When the chief minister Hemant Soren called the ED to record his statement on January 31, why did they reach his official residence in Delhi yesterday? They (BJP) are treating him like a criminal but I would like to state that our CM is not afraid of anyone.”
Governor CP Radhakrishnan called Chief Secretary Lalbiaktluanga Khiangte and Director General of Police Ajay Kumar Singh at the Raj Bhavan here to take stock of the situation. After the meeting, Singh told PTI, "elaborate security arrangements have been made across the state to maintain law and order, including deployment of an additional 7,000 policemen."
JMM and BJP leaders indulged in a war of words over Soren's whereabouts as the 48-year-old JMM executive president came by road from Delhi, undertaking a more than 1250 km journey to Ranchi.
BJP state president and former Chief Minister Babulal Marandi said, "people heaved a sigh of relief as chief minister Hemant Soren, who had fled on foot from his Delhi residence late on the night of January 28, returned to the CM residence in Ranchi safe and secure, almost 40 hours later..."Forget about Delhi, It seems that Hemant ji will not even dream of going anywhere across the border of Jharkhand, let alone by road or air, in the near future. Bhattacharya alleged that Marandi had conspired against Soren.
BJP MP Nishikant Dubey claimed that the Chief Minister's father Shibu Soren had also gone missing for 21 days while being a Union minister and that the son has imbibed some of his attributes.
Countering the BJP attack, Congress MLA Deepika Pandey Singh said, "The BJP’s ED, Delhi Police and IB together could not locate the chief minister. It is an utter failure of (union home minister) Amit Shah. He should resign immediately."