AAP smells rat in BDO notice to Vaghela

PANAJI: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has termed the site inspection notice served to its national executive member Dinesh Vaghela as a personal attack by the government to divert the attention from the issue of chief minister Laxmikant Parsekar’s brother-in-law being reinstated.
Ghanshyam Malvankar alias Dilipwas caught by the anti-corruption bureau on August 19 while accepting a bribe of 1 lakh as a Goa industrial development corporation (GIDC) field officer to allow a plot in Tuem industrial estate.
Last Tuesday, AAP raised the issue of two ACB officials, PI Nolasco Raposo (who was involved in the raid on Malvankar) and SP Bosco George (who supervised the operation), being shunted out of the ACB.
In a letter to the chief minister, AAP gave him one week to explain why Malvankar was reinstated and hadn’t faced any consequences of his actions.
Instead of receiving an explanation, AAP members alleged Vaghela received the site inspection notice that also bears in bold the name of the Aam Aadmi Party, referring to Vaghela as the party’s “chairperson and convener”.
“This is the BJP’s speciality. When they have no reply, they resort to a personal attack to divert attention from the issue,” AAP secretary Valmiki Naik told reporters on Monday.
Vaghela, who owns two flats in the almost three-decade-old Navagauri apartments at Porvorim, which comes under Pilerne village panchayat jurisdiction, said he has nothing to do with the illegal garages and stores being run on the ground floor of the residential building. The flats are used by the party’s national secretary Pankaj Gupta, he said. The party is being unnecessarily dragged into the issue when the flats are in his name, he added.
“Aam Aadmi Party is mentioned two times in the same notice even though the letter is in reference to an alleged illegal construction by some persons,” the party stated in a press note.
“Arvind Kejriwal’s visit to Goa has got the BJP worried. They’re afraid and they’re taking it out on us this way to try and shut us up,” Vaghela said.
The notice, as reported exclusively by TOI in the June 20 edition, was sent by block development officer I, Bardez, K S Pangam, on June 17 asking Vaghela along with others to remain present for the site inspection on June 23.
AAP accused the chief minister of misusing government machinery to intimidate the party by making fictitious connections between the party and illegalities carried out by someone else. The party has dared the BJP-led government to go ahead and demolish the illegal construction instead of trying to drag the AAP into a controversy.
The party reiterated that the one-week deadline to the chief minister ends on Tuesday, and should it receive no reply, the party will take up other forms of protest.