Reported & Written By Kumud Sharma, Diary Times, Shimla, March 15: Baluganj police of Shimla is investigating the accused of conspiring to topple the government in Himachal Pradesh and horse-trading of MLAs. The police had summoned two accused named in this case, independent MLA from Hamirpur Ashish Sharma and retired IAS Rakesh Sharma, father of expelled Congress MLA from Gagret Chaitanya Sharma, for questioning on Friday.
Both the accused, who were on anticipatory bail, did not appear before the Baluganj police. Both their lawyers reached the police station in their place. Both the lawyers told the police the reason for the accused not being able to reach. He said that Ashish Sharma and Rakesh Sharma, who were made accused in this case, could not come to the police station due to being unfit. Both of them are not in good health and are taking rest on the advice of doctors. Baluganj police clarified that the investigation will proceed only when both the accused come to the police station and cooperate in the investigation.
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Let us tell you that on March 12, both the accused were granted conditional anticipatory bail from the High Court. Actually, after being named in the FIR, he had to be taken into custody for questioning by the police. To avoid this, both of them had applied for anticipatory bail in the High Court. High Court Justice Ranjan Sharma had granted him conditional bail on Tuesday during the hearing. The High Court has directed both of them to cooperate in the investigation.
A case has been registered against independent MLA Ashish Sharma and retired IAS Rakesh Sharma at Baluganj Police Station in Shimla under sections 171 E and 171 C, 120 B and sections 7 and 8 of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Apart from these two, other unknown people have also been named in the FIR. Various criminal sections have been imposed against the accused. The police have taken this action on the complaint of two Congress MLAs Sanjay Awasthi and Bhuvneshwar Gaur.
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According to the complaint, the rebel MLA father and the independent MLA have been accused of vote-buying, bribery and money transactions in the Rajya Sabha elections. He is also accused of wrongly influencing the Rajya Sabha elections. The complainants have also alleged that the accused conspired to topple the government. Rakesh Sharma, father of expelled Gagret MLA Chaitanya Sharma, has retired from the post of Chief Secretary in Uttarakhand.
MLAs did cross voting –
Rajya Sabha elections in Himachal were held on 27 February. During that time, due to cross voting of the said nine MLAs, this seat went to BJP account. BJP candidate Harsh Mahajan defeated veteran Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi. In fact, even after cross voting, the candidates of both the parties got 34-34 votes, after which the winning candidate was decided through slip system.
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