A little-known tribal MLA of Bihar’s ruling BJP is likely to become the state’s first elected politician whose allegedly ill-gotten assets could be confiscated in an apparent effort to show that chief minister Nitish Kumar’s anti-corruption initiatives are wide-ranging and unbiased.
The state vigilance department has used the controversial findings of an income-tax department raid in 1997 on the premises of Sonelal Hembrum, a first-time MLA from Katoria in southern Banka district, to seek permission from court for confiscating his movable and immovable assets. Hembrum, who belongs to the Santhal tribe and is one of only two ST legislators in Bihar, was in government service as additional excise commissioner during those raids.
For Bihar’s JD(U)-BJP coalition government, facing criticism for its allegedly selective pursuit of corrupt public servants with ill-gotten assets and exclusion of elected politicians, the action underway against the BJP legislator is expected to be a showpiece with the power to silence political critics. Using a new anti-corruption law it enacted, the government has so far confiscated the assets of three public servants facing graft charges and opened two schools on their premises.
Hembrum is the first MLA to face the consequences under the Bihar Special Courts Act, 2010, which empowers the state to seize the properties of public servants accused of corruption even when under trial. The BJP, the junior ruling ally in Bihar, has been tight-lipped even as Hembrum, charged with amassing `24 lakh, accused the government of “unfairly targeting” him.
“Tribals have no dignity anywhere... Despite the I-T department ruling in my favour in the tribunal, they are now unfairly targeting me. Who will hear a tribal in Bihar? I will say whatever I must only in court,” Hembrum said.