MUMBAI: Maharashtra Water Resources Minister Girish Mahajan on Monday claimed that a contractor had offered him a Rs.100 crore-bribe to clear his pending dues.
“The contractor had claimed that the government owed him Rs.1,000 crore for completing construction works. I found many irregularities and stopped the payment. He approached me with an offer of `100 crore to clear the payment,” Mahajan said. He, however, did not disclose the name of the contractor. Mahajan had recently suspended four government employees for their alleged role in a scam in connection with the construction of a dam at Kondhane.
The Water Resources Department has been in the eye of a storm over graft allegations. While in Opposition, the BJP had alleged that there was a `26,000-crore scam in the department first headed by the NCP’s Ajit Pawar and then by his protege Sunil Tatkare during the erstwhile Cong-NCP Government’s tenure.