FIR against Kripashankar Singh in assets case

Police on Tuesday registered an FIR against senior Congress leader Kripashankar Singh under anti-corruption law in connection with a disproportionate assets case, nearly a week after the Bombay high court had directed it to prosecute him for "criminal misconduct".

"An FIR under relevant sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act and the IPC has been registered against Singh at Nirmal Nagar Police Station at suburban Bandra," a top police official said.

The former Mumbai Pradesh Congress chief is also facing charges of cheating, forgery, destruction of evidence and criminal conspiracy, the official said.

The high court had on February 22 directed Mumbai police commissioner to prosecute Singh for "criminal misconduct" under the Prevention of Corruption Act, while hearing a public interest litigation filed by activist Sanjay Tiwari who alleged the Congress MLA had amassed wealth disproportionate to his known sources of income.

In the petition, Tiwari claimed Singh had been close to former Jharkhand Chief Minister Madhu Koda, currently in jail for alleged involvement in a multi-crore hawala scam.

He alleged several monetary transactions had taken place between them.

Singh's son Narendra Mohan is married to Ankita, daughter of Kamlesh Singh, who was a minister in the Koda cabinet and is now in jail in connection with the hawala scam. Ankita had received Rs 1.75 crore in her account from Kamlesh, the PIL said, adding there were huge transactions from the bank accounts of Kripashankar's wife Malti Devi too.

Singh resigned as the Mumbai Congress chief citing the party's poor showing in the recently held civic elections on the same day the high court had asked the police to seek sanction for his prosecution.

Click here for more Realtime News on Kripashankar Singh!

With inputs from Toral Varia Deshpande