Falsely implicated, says Mizoram BJP MLA sentenced to jail for corruption | North East India News,The Indian Express
BJP Buddha Dhan Chakma, who is out on an interim bail to appeal the verdict in a higher court, said he had returned the money for which he was convicted, a year before the criminal case was registered against him.
Mizoram’s lone BJP MLA Buddha Dhan Chakma, who has been sentenced to a year in jail along with 12 others in a corruption case, said he has been falsely implicated so that his political career is maligned.
Chakma, who is out on an interim bail to appeal the verdict in a higher court, said he had returned the money for which he was convicted, a year before the criminal case was registered against him.
“In spite of clearing our pay advances, the case’s investigating officer charge-sheeted us. Is it not like double punishment for a single case? This is nothing but a conspiracy against us to malign our political images, especially me and Buddha Lila Chakma,” he told a press conference in Aizawl on Wednesday.
A special court on Monday sentenced the legislator and five members of Chakma Autonomous District Council (CADC), including its Chief Executive Member (CEM) Buddha Lila Chakma of ruling MNF, for misappropriating funds of Rs 1.37 crore earmarked for development, between 2013 and 2018. Seven former members of the district council were also among the convicts. They drew the amount as pay advances.
The BJP MLA claimed that doling out advance salaries was a regular practice in the council as the then Congress government in the state used to release funds in instalments every four months in a fiscal.
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