BOMBAY, 14 May 2006 — Senior Cabinet minister of the Maharashtra government Surupsinh Naik of the Congress party, who was embroiled in a controversey over granting licenses to sawmills despite a ban, which led to the Supreme Court handing him a one-month imprisonment, resigned from his post.
The resignation letter faxed to Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, was forwarded to Gov. S.M. Krishna who accepted it.
Naik, who was the transport minister in the Congress-led Democratic Front government, surrendered before the police inspector of Malabar Hill police station, was arrested and driven straight to the Thane district jail, adjoining the city of Bombay.
Though Naik was arrested following warrants issued by the chief metropolitan magistrate, the other accused, Additional Chief Secretary Ashok Khot, who too was sentenced to one-month imprisonment along with Naik, could not be arrested as he was not in town.
Like in Bihar, in most cases involving cases such VVIPs, state governments can identify a guest house and pass a notification declaring it as a jail for VVIPs but the Maharashtra government dithered from doing so.
