On Wednesday, the Uttarakhand Congress leader and former minister Harak Singh Rawat was connected to an alleged forest scam case, which led the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to start searching 17 locations in Chandigarh, Uttarakhand, and Delhi.
Who is Harak Singh Rawat?
Leader of the Uttarakhand Congress Harak Singh Rawat, who served as a minister in the party’s previous government and was a member of the BJP until January 2022
Over a thirty-year career, Rawat began with the BJP. He ran in his first Assembly election from the Pauri seat in 1991. In addition, he went on to become one of the youngest ministers in the Kalyan Singh government of the then-undivided state of Uttar Pradesh.
He joined the Bahujan Samaj Party in 1998. After the BSP refused to give him a ticket, he switched again in 2022, this time to the Congress. In that year’s Assembly elections, he was elected to the Lansdowne seat. When B C Khanduri of the BJP was chief minister from 2007 to 2012, he was the leader of the opposition.
Although Rawat was admitted into the Cabinet, he lost the 2012 contest to become Chief Minister to Vijay Bahuguna.
Four years later, former chief minister Harish Rawat’s government was overthrown by nine Congress lawmakers who teamed up with the BJP in 2016. Rawat was displeased that he had not been given key departments like Public Works and Power.
However, the Uttarakhand BJP expelled Rawat from the party in January 2022, citing his lack of discipline for a six-year period. The action was taken a month after Pushkar Singh Dhami, the current chief minister, had chaired a cabinet meeting in which Rawat, the minister for labor, employment, and skill development, as well as for forests and environment, had threatened to resign.
Harak Singh Rawat Daugher-in-law
Rawat and his daughter-in-law Anukriti Gusain joined the Congress five days after Rawat was expelled from the BJP. To greet Rawat, the Congress party presented a unified front and made sure that every member of its Uttarakhand lineup was present in Delhi.
Enforcement Directorate (ED) raids Harak Singh Rawat linked premises in Uttarakhand.
The sources state that the ED teams are searching Rawat’s Defence Colony residence as well as a medical college in Dehradun.
A case against Rawat regarding purported tree-cutting, financial irregularities, and unauthorized construction in the Pakhro Tiger Reserve area of Corbett National Park in 2019 is connected to the ED raid. When Rawat was the forest minister in the previous BJP government, the development of the Pakhro Tiger Reserve was one of his pet projects. After being expelled from the state cabinet and the BJP primary membership for six years as a result of alleged anti-party activities, he joined the Congress prior to the 2022 Uttarakhand Assembly elections.
Following reports of unauthorized building and tree-cutting in the Corbett Tiger Reserve (CTR), the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) in October 2021 and representatives of the Union Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change (MoEFCC) in December 2021 conducted inspections.
The construction of a water feature close to the Pakhro forest rest house, houses in Morghati, and Kandi Road were all found to have irregularities during the inspections. Additionally, it was discovered that the proposed tiger safari in Pakhro would violate the All India Services Conduct Rules, the Wildlife (Conservation) Act of 1972, the Forest (Conservation) Act of 1970, and the Indian Forest Act of 1927 by cutting down trees.
Two generators were taken by Vigilance from the Doon Institute of Medical Sciences in Shankarpur and the Amravati gas station, according to sources. Both of these generators were said to have been installed at the two establishments and bought with government funds. The team also examined the institute’s records and questioned staff members and the former minister during the raids.
Speaking to the media, Rawat went on to state that the forest department had been asked in a letter dated January 2022 to remove those generators, but that request had gone unanswered.
In the case of the unlawful construction in Jim Corbett Park and the felling of thousands of trees, the Uttarakhand High Court adopted a strong stance. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) was given control of the investigation in September 2023 during the hearing of a public interest litigation (PIL) concerning the allegations. The high court also ordered the Uttarakhand investigating agencies to collaborate with the CBI.