Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar and Nawab Malik (Right)
Mumbai: In what appears to be a snub to the BJP, Maharashtra’s deputy chief minister and NCP president Ajit Pawar has nominated three members of the family of senior party leader and former minister Nawab Malik for contesting the elections to the BrihanMumbai Municipal Elections (BMC).
Pawar had appointed Malik as the chairman of NCP’s election management committee for Mumbai.
The BJP has objected to Malik’s name in the wake of cases against him involving property deals with relatives and aides of underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.
Incidentally, Malik’s daughter Sana Malik is the NCP MLA from Anushakti Nagar in Mumbai.
In BMC, which comprises of 227 electoral wards, the BJP, which leads the Maha Yuti-NDA dispensation, is going ahead with alliance with Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena and other parties like Ramdas Athawale-headed RPI (Athawale), however, had kept the NCP at bay.
On Sunday night, the NCP announced the first list of 37 candidates for the BMC.
The NCP is likely to contest 100-plus seats in Mumbai.
The list includes three members of the Malik family — brother Kaptan Malik will contest from Ward No 165, his sister Dr Saeeda Malik will contest from Ward No. 168 and niece Bushra Malik from Ward No 170.
The Malik family call the shots in the Kurla-Anushakti Nagar area.
It may be mentioned, Mumbai BJP president Ameet Satam and his predecessor and state cultural affairs minister Ashish Shelar were against Malik’s name as the NCP head for election affairs in Mumbai - and the party high command including state BJP president Ravindra Chavan and chief minister Devendra Fadnavis went by their call.
It may be mentioned, Malik was arrested on 23 February, 2022 by the ED - under the provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) - in connection with a money laundering probe linked to the activities of Pakistan-based underworld don and the mastermind of 1993 serial blasts Dawood Ibrahim. According to the ED charges, Malik had brought the Goawala Building properly in Kurla.
The power of attorney of the property was in the name of Sardar Shah Wali Khan, who is undergoing jail term in the 1993 blasts case and Salim Patel, the frontman of Dawood Ibrahim’s sister late Hasina Parkar. The ED case followed an FIR by the NIA in the Dawood Ibrahim-money laundering case. On 11 August, 2023, the Supreme Court granted him bail on medical grounds and three days later, he was discharged from the hospital, where he was admitted.
Malik, who was once the NCP chief spokesperson, is currently on bail from the Supreme Court.