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TORONTO — A former employee of Ontario’s 407 private freeway quit suddenly Wednesday as a Progressive Conservative candidate in next month’s election, barely an hour after the highway confirmed that information on 60,000 customers had been leaked through an “internal theft.”

Simmer Sandhu, the candidate for Brampton East, said in an online statement that he had recently been made aware of anonymous allegations against him “pertaining to both my work life and my nomination campaign.”

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“These allegations are totally baseless. I absolutely deny them,” he said on both Twitter and Facebook. “I will vigorously defend myself and reputation and I am confident I will be cleared.”

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But he said it would be impossible to continue as a candidate while doing so and that the election is too important “to get caught up in the issues surrounding any one person.”

A cached version of his election website, which had been shut down by early Wednesday evening, says Sandhu has worked at 407 ETR the last nine years, most recently as a litigation analyst in the collections department. A company spokesman said he left the job this February.