Rajashri Shreepat Palande and her aide asked a garage owner to cough up Rs 5 lakh to cancel an MRTP notice

The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) of Mumbai arrested a female Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) corporator and her aide for demanding Rs 5 lakh from a garage owner in Chembur on Friday.

The BJP corporator has been identified as Rajashri Shreepat Palande, 40, of ward number 144. According to ACB officials, the garage owner, who owns a garage near Shalimar Petrol Pump in Chembur, was served an MRTP (Maharashtra Regional Town Planning) notice by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) last week.

The corporator and one of her aides, Sunil Govindram Khanna, 45, approached him and told him that he would have to give them a small place for a shop in his garage and also cough up Rs 5 lakh if he wanted to cancel the notice.

“The garage owner then approached one of his relatives, who is a politician, and met the ACB officials, who laid a trap to nab the duo. ACB officials asked the complainant to negotiate for an initial amount of R50,000 and recorded the conversation,” said

the officer.

Once Khanna accepted the money at CJ Gidwani road in Chembur on Friday night on behalf of the corporator, he and Palande both were arrested and produced before a court on Saturday. “While searching Palande’s residence, we found Rs 25,000 in cash. We also learnt that Khanna owns two flats and two shops,” said an ACB official on condition of anonymity.