india

Updated: Jun 27, 2017 17:20 IST

PATNA

In a swift turn of events, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) on Saturday terminated the licence of Bihar health minister Tej Pratap Yadav’s petrol pump and a Patna court, later in the day, stayed the execution of the state-owned oil company’s order.

The oil firm had sent the licence termination order to M/s Lara Automobiles, represented by its proprietor Tej Pratap Yadav, after he failed to furnish a satisfactory explanation to the notice issued over the allocation of the property in Patna.

Later, a letter issued by Tej Pratap’s lawyer S D Yadav said, “the sub-judge 11, Patna, vide an order dated 16.6.2017, has been pleased to grant ex parte temporary injunction restraining the defendant (BPCL) from causing obstruction to the plaintiff till he appears and files his say to application for temporary injunction, fixing 23.06.2017 as the next date in the aforesaid case.”

On May 31, BPCL had issued notice to Tej Pratap, son of Rashtriya Janata Dal president Lalu Prasad and former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi, seeking an explanation on the petrol pump licence. The oil company had sought an explanation as to how he acquired the licence and asked him to reply within 15 days.

The notice, signed by BPCL territory manager (retail), Patna, Manish Kumar, followed a complaint that Tej Pratap had acquired the petrol pump on Patna’s busy Anisabad bypass road on the basis of wrong information furnished by him. The BPCL officials neither confirmed nor denied the action.

Senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi had earlier alleged that the petrol pump had been fraudulently allotted to Tej Pratap during the UPA 2 regime at the Centre. Modi had alleged that Tej Pratap did not have the stipulated 43 decimal of land for setting up the petrol pump at the time of applying for it.

He added that it was in 2012, when beer manufacturing baron Amit Katyal, managing director of the firm A K Infosystem Pvt Ltd, leased out around 136 decimal of land to Prasad’s younger son Tejashwi Prasad Yadav for setting up a petrol pump.

While Tej Pratap could not be contacted for his comments, his brother and Bihar deputy chief minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav termed the action as “political vendetta.”

“I will not comment on the issue now, but will wait for a legal action to be taken on the people who are accusing us. This is all political vendetta. I would like to say that nothing of this sort can affect the party in any way. If the opposition thinks that they can say and do anything to break our spirit, then they are wrong,” he told reporters.

BLURB

Senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi had earlier alleged that the petrol pump had been fraudulently allotted to Tej Pratap during the UPA 2 regime at the Centre