Lottery 'scam': Ex-minister rubbishes ex-IAS officer's claims in Maha

Mumbai, June 15: Former NCP minister Jayant Patil today rubbished a claim by a retired IAS officer that a massive 'online lottery scam' took place during the Congress-NCP regime in Maharashtra.

Anand Kulkarni, who retired this year as the Maharashtra Additional Chief Secretary, had held then Finance Minister Jayant Patil and senior IAS officer Kavita Gupta responsible for the 'scam'.

"Kulkarni is making allegations at a time when I am out of India. I wish to state that never in my tenure as minister did I do anything which will cause loss to people of the state," Patil said in a statement released here by the NCP today.

"This is a vicious claim, having personal motive, as I had exposed Kulkarni's massive corruption in transfer of senior officials of PWD," Patil said. "Because of our efforts the revenue of the state government from lotteries rose from Rs 15 crore to Rs 300 crore.

At the same time, the number of lotteries was reduced from 3000 to 30," the NCP leader said. On allegations about Kavita Gupta, who was also former Lottery Commissioner, Patil said he is not the proper authority to comment as to why she was kept in the same post for four years, as the power to transfer officials on that post was with the CM.

Kulkarni had yesterday claimed a 15-page confidential report on lottery operations was "suppressed" during the Congress-NCP regime. "The report exposed gross violation of Central guidelines, and a nexus between the Finance department and private lottery operators", he had claimed.

A senior IPS officer had in his report said there was a nexus between the Ministry of Finance and the private lottery company and had mooted immediate closure of online lottery in the state, Kulkarni had said.

PTI