Devendra Fadnavis acquitted in election affidavit non-disclosure case
The case was initiated by a Nagpur-based lawyer, who alleged that Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis had failed to disclose two criminal cases of cheating and forgery registered against him in 1996 and 1998.
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis was acquitted by a Nagpur magistrate court of charges related to the non-disclosure of criminal cases in his 2014 election affidavit. The case was initiated by Nagpur-based lawyer Satish Uke, who alleged that Fadnavis had failed to disclose two criminal cases of cheating and forgery registered against him in 1996 and 1998.
Civil judge SS Jadhav pronounced the verdict today after Fadnavis and the Nagpur-based lawyer Satish appeared before the magistrate via video conferencing.
Fadnavis, who was summoned before the magistrate on April 15, refuted the charges against him.
Fadnavis argued that the omission of the two cases from his election affidavit was not deliberate but an "oversight" by his lawyer, Uday Dable. Fadnavis further said that it was due to Dable's mistake that the two "insignificant" private complaints against him did not reflect in his election affidavit submitted in 2014.
Fadnavis assured the court that there was no intention to deliberately conceal the information about the criminal cases.
He said, "Uday Dable is my local lawyer and I had asked him to collect information about pending criminal cases against me to be mentioned in my nomination form. It appears that the collation of information inadvertently left out two complaint cases and therefore only 22 criminal cases were mentioned in the affidavit."
The case dates back to 2014 when Uke first filed a complaint and that the Magistrate court ruled against Fadnavis. However, this decision was later overturned by the Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court. Uke then took the case to the Supreme Court, which held that there was a case for the prosecution of Fadnavis.
The Supreme Court set aside the judgment of the Bombay High Court and remanded the matter for a fresh trial. Fadnavis' review petition against this order was dismissed by the top court in 2020.