Justice M L Dudhat who was appointed to inquire into the charges against Shashikant Sutar arrived in Mumbai on Friday.

MUMBAI, May 2: Despite all the sceptics and politicians having questioned the ability of a social activist to expose corruption in the highest echelons of the State, the small big man from Ralegan Siddhi has won a victory that is not small by any measure.

He has got the head of at least one minister of the alliance government, albeit on prima facie evidence. The other minister, Mahadeo Shivankar of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has been exonerated because several of the complaints received by the Puranik Committee, turned out to be false and complainants did not appear before the Committee.

But the report of the Committee, while giving one a view into how a `trusted Shiv Sainik Shashikant Sutar amassed wealth that would put medieval chieftains to shame, also gives some sage advice to the government, particularly on the matter of transfers of officials.

If the government has had to accept the resignation of Sutar despite his emotional defence of himself in the Assembly the day the report was tabled, and his boss in the party making feeble noises through the party mouthpiece, Saamna, Hazare certainly has achieved a big victory.

Will the Income Tax department now get into the act, and take the prima facie findings to their logical conclusion?

According to the Puranik Committee report, Sutar constructed two big houses in Shivtirth Nagar in Kothrud, Pune, valued at Rs 45 lakh, and in the Gujarat Colony, Kothrud, another house worth Rs 4.5 lakh on Plot no. 65. These, he constructed during his tenure as minister. He has many other properties, in the name of his wife and sons which were built or bought before he became a minister in 1995.About his unauthorised house on Plot no. 65, his neighbour, T P Khutal told the Committee how the plot of land was earmarked as a ``vacant space'' and no permanent construction was to be allowed according to the development plan.

Sutar first built small tenements on the plot and without permission of the Municipal Corporation, also built a two storeyed permanent structure there. The Pune Municipal Commissioner Ramnath Jha told the Committee that the minister had applied for repairs of his hutment on the plot, (which is a total of 6,000 square metres area) in December 1994. The permission was granted on the same day. The vacant space could not be used for building pucca structures even under the Maharashtra Slum Clearance and Improvement Act, even if slums had been allowed.

It was revealed that Sutar had acquired permission for building an RCC structure in clear violation of the Urban Development rules. The PMC also issued him a notice to show cause why the structure should not be demolished. The notice is still pending.

Perhaps the Dudhat Commission of Inquiry, or the Income Tax department, will throw more light on the sources of the income through which the other property of the minister and his family was bought. This includes a plot of land of four hectares at Wadebolai in the name of Rasika Sutar. Two other plots of land, bought in 1987, (one of 18 hectares and another of one hectare) in Daund taluka are registered in the names of his (then) minor sons.The other six plots of land are in the name of his wife, Rasika - in Varje village, Taluka Haveli, bought during his tenure as minister. These are totally valued at Rs 15 lakh.

In Madhavbaug Colony, Sutar's wife, his son and sister-in-law own four plots of land - numbered 14, 15, 21 and 49.

Construction on these plots has been done in 1992, and work is in progress on two of them.

The Committee also found that Sutar has overidden the advice and guidelines of the General Administration Department to make large scale transfers of officials of the agriculture depatment. Taking data from senior officials of agriculture, Justice Puranik found that several officials had been transferred within a short period of their postings, and that Sutar rejected the reports of the Director of Agriculture on transfers.

While Sutar appeared before the Committee on February 18, 1997, and 13 March, 1997 (at his own request to the Committee), he said that his properties, 19 in all, were bought out of income from a hotel owned jointly by him and his son in 1994. His older son manages two hotels namely Naivedhayam and Rajlakshmi.

Though Sutar contradicted himself at his testimony on March 10, disowning any knowledge of his son Prithviraj Sutar's assets, the Committee had found that Sutar owned or acquired property worth Rs 57 lakhs during his tenure as minister. That itself the Committee has found is indicative of corrupt means even if strict evidence of the same is not available.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.