Rs 16 lakh seized from hotel room of Congress candidate in Hazaribagh, BJP demands cancellation of candidature

Hazaribagh/Ranchi: A team of the district administration conducted raids at a hotel in the city and recovered cash worth Rs 16 lakh from the rooms which were booked in the name of Congress nominee Gopal Sahu who is contesting from Hazaribagh.

The district electoral officer had yesterday night received a secret tip off that cash was being exchanged in the hotel room which was also functional as camp office of Mr Sahu. A team led by DDC Vijaya Jadhav and SDO Megha Bhardwaj conducted the raids at hotel AK International in which sleuths of the IT department were also present.

Upon seeing the police and district administration officials a couple of men who were present inside the room managed to flee leaving behind the cash. Further probe was on.

On the other hand, addressing a press conference today at the BJP headquarters in Ranchi spokesperson Pratul Shahdeo demanded that legal action should be taken against the Congress candidate and his candidature should be cancelled. He said that the party has received information that Congress and other opposition parties are making misuse of money and demanded the election commission to take cognizance of the matter.

Pratul said that the entire incident shows that Congress has lost support of the people and it was trying to purchase the vote using money power and said that people will reject the Congress candidate. He alleged that at the time when the money was recovered from the room Congress candidate was himself present in adjacent room and said that the amount recovered was all black money.