Maharashtra / Will file a defamation case against Param Bir: Deshmukh amid corruption claims

Mumbai:  Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh said on Saturday evening that he will file a defamation case against former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh for accusing him of corruption.

Deshmukh, an NCP leader, had tweeted earlier refuting Singh's allegation that he had asked police officers to collect money from bars, restaurants and other establishments.

In a statement, Deshmukh also asked why Singh was keeping silent for so long, and alleged that the IPS officer, shunted out from the post of city police commissioner on Wednesday, was only trying to save his own skin in the Sachin Waze case.

"The allegations made by Singh are false and I am filing a case of defamation against him," Deshmukh said.

"In the Mukesh Ambani case and the Mansukh Hiran death case, Sachin Waze's involvement was established and the trail was to reach Param Bir Singh. It is due to this possibility that these allegations have been leveled," Deshmukh said.

On Thursday, a day after Param Bir Singh was shunted out, Deshmukh had said he was transferred after some of his colleagues committed "serious and unforgivable mistakes".

Singh alleged in his letter to Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray that Deshmukh had told Waze that he had set a target of collecting Rs 100 crore a month, half of it from nearly 1,750 bars, restaurants and similar establishments operating in the city.

" If Sachin Waze told him about this in February, why was Singh quiet till now? Singh took the decision to reinstate Sachin Waze after 16 years (after he was suspended in Khwaja Yunus custodial death case)," Deshmukh said.

"Sensing trouble in the explosives case, Singh has leveled baseless allegations to blackmail the government. This is a conspiracy by Singh to mislead the probe into the explosives and Mansukh Hiran death cases," the minister said.

The chief minister should order an impartial probe in Singh's allegations, he added.

Waze was arrested by the NIA last week in connection with the recovery of explosives-laden Scorpio near industrialist Mukesh Ambani's residence here last month.

The NIA has also taken over the case related to the mysterious death of Mansukh Hiran, from whose possession the SUV had been allgedly stolen.