new Delhi: Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel condemned Pakistan Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto’s personal remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said that no one has the right to make personal attacks on the prime minister and Bhutto should be given a befitting reply.
“I condemn the statement made by Bilawal Bhutto (Pakistan’s foreign minister), a befitting reply should be given. No one has the right to make such statements about our PM. We have different political ideologies but this is about the nation and Modi is our prime minister,” news agency ANI quoted Baghel as saying.
Referring to the recent arrest of his deputy secretary Soumya Chaurasia in connection with a money laundering probe in the alleged coal levy scam in the state, Baghel said the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was sending central agencies to defame the government.
“Our government is taking decisions in favor of common people including farmers, tribals and students. They (BJP) could not do this in the last 15 years but we did it in four years. They are sending ED, IT, DRI but people understand that it is a conspiracy to defame us,” said CM Baghel.
Our government is taking decisions in favor of common people including farmers, tribals and students. They (BJP) could not do it in the last 15 years but we did it in four years. Sending ED, IT, DRI but people understand it’s a conspiracy to defame us: Chhattisgarh CM pic.twitter.com/CcS4HIJvfz
– ANI MP/CG/Rajasthan (@ANI_MP_CG_RJ) December 17, 2022
“We are also against corruption but if you act with ill intention then we will not support it. BJP is unable to fight us in the state and hence they are using ED, IT and other agencies,” the chief minister further said.
It is noteworthy that last year the Income Tax Department had raided Chhattisgarh’s capital Raipur and claimed to have busted an alleged hawala racket worth over Rs 100 crore. The ED started probing the money laundering angle after taking cognizance of the Income Tax department’s complaint.
The ED alleged that an illegal levy of Rs 25 per tonne was being made from each tonne of coal transported to Chhattisgarh by a cartel involving senior bureaucrats, businessmen, politicians and middlemen.
