Acting on the Supreme Court's order, the Army has begun the process of taking over the possession of the scam-tainted Adarsh building at Colaba in South Mumbai.
Former Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan, an accused in the multi-crore Adarsh scam, returned Rs 69 lakh, allegedly received by him from his "close aide" Jayant Shah to purchase flats for his relatives at the highrise, soon after the scandal was unearthed and a public interest litigation was filed in the Bombay high court in 2010.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and his cabinet colleagues Pankaja Munde and Vinod Tawde, Union minister Nitin Gadkari, state minister Sadabhau Khot, former Union Home minister Sushilkumar Shinde and Shiv Sena leader Manohar Joshi were prominent among those who installed Ganpati idols at their homes.
Claiming that there was a bid to separate Mumbai from Maharashtra, Shiv Sena executive president Uddhav Thackeray on Wednesday said the megapolis was not for sale.
Thorat, 66, has been a farmers' leader and has been involved in the cooperative movement in Maharashtra. He is also a former revenue minister
Former Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan and 13 others have been slapped with a money laundering case by the Enforcement Directorate for their alleged involvement in the Adarsh housing scam.
A division bench of the Bombay high court on Tuesday recused itself from hearing a bunch of public interest litigations in the Adarsh scam case and also the application of former Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan who has sought quashing of the corruption case against him.
On the third anniversary of the 26/11 attacks, family members of the four missing fishermen abroad Kuber, the boat hijacked by terrorists, have requested the Maharashtra chief minister to provide financial assistance to them. The Gujarat Fishermen Association has demanded aid to the kin of the fishermen, saying it had raised the demand soon after the attack and had even requested the then chief minister Ashok Chavan to consider their pleas on sympathetic grounds.
As per the final tally, of the total 81 seats, the Congress won 73, followed by the BJP which bagged six seats. The Shiv Sena just about managed to open its account with one seat, and an independent candidate won one seat.
Former Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan's wife Amita had lent Rs 6 lakh to her sister-in-law Seema Sharma to purchase a flat in the scam-tainted Adarsh building located in south Mumbai.
The Karnataka-Maharashtra border dispute dominated political space in New Delhi on Saturday with Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa pledging not to compromise on the security of the "linguistic minority" of the Marathi-speaking people in Belgaum region even as Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan led a Congress delegation to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and the prime minister to complain about repression and police atrocities to these people in the disputed areas.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader Kirit Somaiya on Saturday released documents obtained under the Right To Information Act which contradict the claims of politicians that the land on which Adarsh cooperative housing society was built was never intended for defence personnel. Congress Member of Legislative Council Kanhaiyalal Gidwani and former chief minister Ashok Chavan had previously refuted the allegations of any irregularity in the development of the plot.
'It was disappointing on two counts. One is on the leadership issue and second is how the Congress must win elections.'
Close on the heels of Congress axing Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan from the post in the wake of Adarsh Housing Society scam, five disqualifed Karnataka Bharatiya Janata Party MLAs asked their high command to apply the same yardstick to Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa and seek his resignation.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi has accepted Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan's resignation in the wake of the Adarsh Housing Society scam.Chavan had earlier offered to resign over the scam that has erupted about the construction of a high-rise building in a posh area of Mumbai. The Congress high command is reportedly upset with Chavan, whose mother-in-law and two other relatives are among the 103 members of the controversial Adarsh Housing Society.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan and Protocol Minister Suresh Shetty would receive United States President Barack Obama as the state representatives along with Union Minister Salman Khurshid.
Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa's announcement -- that his government may grant second capital status to Belgaum -- has evoked sharp reactions from political parties in Maharashtra. Maharashtra has been demanding that Marathi speaking areas of Karnataka, including Belgaum, be merged with the state. Leaders of Congress, Shiv Sena and NCP flayed the statement. Maharashtra CM Ashok Chavan said Yeddyurappa had spoken out of turn.
Holding that the Adarsh Housing scam was a classic case of fence eating the crops and 'consistent failure' of Centre and Maharashtra government, the Comptroller and Auditor General on Tuesday said rules were bent to benefit relatives of politicians, public servants and senior service officers including former Army chiefs Gen Deepak Kapoor and N C Vij.
'Sonia Gandhi can't rejuvenate the party, her heir is fodder for stand-up comedians, and nobody in the Congress has the guts to question the Nehru-Gandhis.'
Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan on Tuesday said the 865 Marathi-speaking villages in Karnataka (comprising of Belgaum, Karwar, Gulbarga and Bidar) should be made a Union Territory.
Munde, a Nationalist Congress Party leader, had attended a state cabinet meeting earlier this week and taken part in the Nationalist Congress Party's foundation day event two days ago in Mumbai.
The Congress Legislature Party (CLP) in Maharashtra authorised All India Congress Committee president Sonia Gandhi to choose a new leader to succeed Ashok Chavan who resigned as chief minister in the wake of Adarsh Housing Society scam.
How Vikhe-Patil -- who is nearly 80 years old -- will fit in with party General Secretary Rahul Gandhi's agenda of installing younger leaders as chief ministers is not known.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday described as "mere eyewash" the removal of Ashok Chavan as Maharashtra Chief Minister and Suresh Kalmadi being stripped off key posts and demanded probe against all those directly or indirectly involved in Mumbai's Adarsh Housing Society and Commonwealth Games scams.
The opposition in Lok Sabha on Tuesday took the government to task over various scams including allocation of 2G spectrum, Commonwealth Games and Adarsh housing, and said the resignation of Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan was "not enough".
Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan presented US President Barack Obama a coffee table book on the state and requested him to keep it in the White House museum.
The US Consulate in Mumbai apologised for having asked invitees to President Barack Obama's functions to submit personal details like PAN numbers after it drew angry reaction from senior Maharashtra ministers and officials and blamed "clerical error" for the queries.
A Defence Ministry probe has "prima facie" found a "criminal conspiracy" in scam-hit Adarsh Housing Society project in Mumbai in which some relatives of Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan being beneficiaries has emerged.
Amid indications that his continuance in office may be untenable, Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan has been summoned to meet Congress president Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi on Saturday.
The Election Commission of India will on Friday hear a petition which makes serious allegations of electoral malpractices against Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan. The issue has multiple ramifications for Indian democracy, polity and media. The issue has rattled CM Chavan who, if convicted, can face disqualification from the legislature for three years. Bharatiya Janata Party leader Kirit Somaiya, one of the complainants against Chavan, explains his case.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan has sought information on the row over the allotment of a prime plot of land to Adarsh co-operative housing society but it has now emerged that the members include his late mother-in-law Bhagwati Manoharlal Sharma. Chavan was unavailable for comment. The name of Sharma, who died in July, appears in the official list submitted by the society whose beneficiaries include former services chiefs, politicians and bureaucrats.
The controversy over fund collection for Congress president Sonia Gandhi's rally at Sevagram in Wardha district on Friday could land Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee chief Manikrao Thakre in trouble. The All India Congress Committe indicated that it was not coming to the rescue of the beleaguered leader, amid questions whether he was off the hook or being proceeded against.
Maharashtra government will file cases against the security guards of embattled IPL commissioner Lalit Modi for physically assaulting journalists, Chief Minister Ashok Chavan told the Legislative Assembly on Wednesday.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will launch Aadhaar, the Unique Identification (UID) project, in Maharashtra's tribal-dominated Nanduarbar district on September 29.
According to BJP National Secretary Kirit Sommaiya, then Chief Minister Ashok Chavan had given six builders in Mumbai 235 lakh sq ft of land belonging to the Central and State Government, civic and defence authorities at throwaway prices.
The controversial Adarsh Society in South Mumbai on Tuesday moved the Bombay high court seeking de-freezing of its two bank accounts.
Racing against time to become a member of the Maharashtra legislature, Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan has decided to contest the state legislative council elections.
Two months after initiating a preliminary inquiry, CBI had on January 29 registered an FIR against 13 people, including Chavan, retired army officials, bureaucrats and state government officials on charges of criminal conspiracy, fraud and misuse of their official powers.
Having achieved the unique distinction of scoring the first double century in One-day internationals, Sachin Tendulkar is now on the threshold of becoming the first sportsperson to be conferred the Bharat Ratna. The Maharashtra government is all set to recommend the batting maestro for India's highest civilian award.
Shiv Sena executive chief Uddhav Thackeray on Friday lashed out at the Congress saying that the party needed everything imported, including a leader.