MP Lokayukta to investigate into BJP Minister's disproportionate assets

Bhopal: Senior BJP leader and Urban Development Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Bhupendra Singh, is set to be investigated by the Lokayukta regarding allegations of possessing disproportionate assets on the complaint filed by Puneet Tandon, a Congress leader.

Singh claimed that this is a tactic employed by the opposition to tarnish his reputation in order to gain an advantage in the upcoming assembly elections, which are scheduled to take place in five months.

Tandon, the head of the RTI cell of the Madhya Pradesh Congress unit, has accused the minister that he has amassed a large number of properties including farmlands, a hotel and a petrol pump in the name of his family metopmbers, and has demanded an inquiry. On the basis of this, the Lokayukta issued a directive to the Director General of Special Police Establishment (Lokayukta) to register a case and conduct an inquiry.

"Lokayukta has sought an inquiry report by August 8 about the Congress leader's complaint against Urban Development Minister Bhupendra Singh," said an official.

The minister, however, claimed the opposition was trying to tarnish his image and he would file a defamation suit against the Congress leaders.

The case comes at a time when the Assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh are to take place in just five months and the ruling BJP is trying hard to reduce the anti-incumbency feeling and the growing sentiment of people against the allegations of corruption against the BJP government.

Bhupendra Singh (63), MLA from Khurai in Sagar district, had also supervised the 'Mahakal Lok' corridor project in Ujjain. Singh, who was the Home Minister (2013-2018) during the previous tenure of Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan's government, was also reportedly said to be challenging the state leadership.

Singh was also elected as an MP from the Sagar Lok Sabha constituency in 2009