Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis refuses to junk Mahadev Jankar

Devendra Fadnavis said the court would decide on the further course of action in the case against Mahadev Jankar File picsNagpur The statersquos dairy development minister Mahadev Jankar who has been booked for breaching election code of conduct will stay in the Cabinet Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis told the Legislative Assembly on Tuesday He said the charges against Jankar were noncognisable and the court would decide on the further course of action in the caseJankar keeps mumFadnavis was responding to the oppositionrsquos demand for sacking Jankar an associate of the BJP and president of a regional party Rashtriya Samaj Paksh RSP Jankar kept mum when the Congress and the NCP raised the matterThe opposition benches shouted slogans entered the well of the house and walked out when the Speaker did not allow disruption of the question hour However Jankar remained absent when CM defended him after the question hourldquoYou are doing injustice to the minister by asking him to resign because charges against him have not been proven yet The charges are noncognisable and they can be probed only when the court asks for doing so We must wait till the case is decidedrdquo he said adding that the previous government had allowed a serving minister Gulabrao Devkar of the NCP to work despite the Supreme Court scrapping his bail in a housing scamldquoThe case against Jankar is at a preliminary stage I will neither go into merits and demerits of the case nor will I give a clean chit to the minister because he has admitted to making that phone call It is for the courts to deciderdquo the CM saidExCM slams govtExCM Prithviraj Chavan slammed the government ldquoYou have given technical reasons but where is your morality The Prime Minister says his fight against corruption will continue and here in Maharashtra a minister commits a crime which is even serious than a financial fraud You must remove Jankar from the cabinet till the case is decidedrdquo demanded ChavanThe case against JankarOn December 5 the State Election Commission SEC had served a show cause notice to Jankar when a video of him calling a returning officer went viral Jankar wanted the officer to favour Jesamal Arjundas Motwani an independent candidate and a Congress rebel by granting him the symbol of a cup and saucer which is the RSPrsquos symbol He also told the officer to somehow render Congressrsquo official candidate invalid for the election so that his supporter remained in the frayIn his response to the SEC Jankar has admitted to have talked to the returning officer but denied having used his official position to pressurize him He said he had made an informal request to the officer because the candidate in question had filed nomination from the Congress as wellComplaint filedThe SEC had asked Jankar to explain himself in 24 hours or else face action under election laws When Commissioner JS Saharia was not satisfied with Jankarrsquos reply He directed the Desaiganj police to register a complaint against Jankar and Motwani The complaint was filed late Saturday night on the charges of influencing and obstructing a government servant from discharging his official duty and relevant sections in the state local selfgovernment and industrial town actThe commission initiated the action after the state Congress filed a complaint with the commission in Mumbai on December 5 the first day of the winter session of the state legislature The party has demanded Jankarrsquos resignation In view of Jankarrsquos alleged violation Saharia has scrapped election process in the civic ward 9B where Motwani had filed his nomination Jankar has denied allegations He said his party supported Motwani and hence he requested returning officer for allotting him his partyrsquos election symbolWho is JankarMahadev Jankar president of RSP which is BJPrsquos small alliance partner was inducted in the cabinet early this year He had invited ire of NCP workers a couple of months ago after using derogatory language against exdeputy chief minister Ajit Pawar Following this the CM had reprimanded Jankar In yet another incident the minister was accused of getting physical with participants of a protest march in Nagpur last week