The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has nominated bureaucrat-turned-politician Vijay Pandhare as its candidate for the Lok Sabha elections from Nashik constituency. The party declared its first list of LS candidates on Sunday, two days after party chief Arvind Kejriwal quit the Delhi CM post.
The former chief engineer of Maharashtra Engineering and Training Academy (META), who blew the whistle on the multi-crore irrigation scam in the state, had joined the party immediately after his retirement in December last year.
NCP senior leader Chhagan Bhujbal is a state cabinet minister and his nephew Sameer is the member of parliament from Nashik. Pandhare said that there was no reservation in his mind while taking on the Bhujbals in Nashik.
The electoral contest in Nashik would be a common man standing against corrupt forces. In Nashik, there will be a fight against corruption and corrupt people. The people will have to choose between corruption and a common man.
The whistleblower, who has been questioning the government moves since he joined the service, objected to unfair practices and as a result was transferred several times in less than a year till he was posted as chief engineer in Nashik in 2011.
Pandhare has been skeptical about the outcome of the one member Madhav Chitale committee–the special investigation team (SIT) formed by the state government for the probe the allegations of irregularities in the Rs 70,000 irrigation scam. He had sent a 33-point list of issues on the role of politicians and bureaucrats in the scam.
