NCP was not aware of confidential lottery report

Tuesday 5th of July 2016

The NCP leader and former finance minister Jayant Patil has alleged he was not aware of a confidential report that exposed financial irregularities in the lottery sector, local media reports.

Last month, Maharashtra’s former government came under fire for allegedly keeping a ‘confidential report’ under wraps during their term, causing the loss of millions of dollars of potential tax revenue in the state.

The document which was procured through the Right To Information Act revealed that the NCP government kept the confidential report on the illegal lotteries scam “on the backburner” during their term, thus paving the way for private operators to indulge in tax evasion and run illegal businesses.

On Tuesday, the BJP government ordered an investigation into the scam.

However, the NCP leader said the report was prepared without consultation with the finance ministry, and was never discussed in the Congress-NCP Cabinet.

“Frankly, I was never aware of any such confidential report by the home department even though I was holding the finance ministry. But when matters came to light through discussions in the Assembly, I contested the contents, which were compiled without talking to the departments concerned in the ministry of finance,” said Patil, adding the report was flawed, and said the claims were baseless.