Akhilesh faces bill for ''damage'' to official bungalow

Former Uttar Pradesh chief minister and Samajwadi Party (SP) supremo Akhilesh Yadav may have to cough up Rs 6 lakh for ''damaging'' his official bungalow, which he vacated in June this year on Supreme Court orders.

According to sources here on Thursday, a report submitted by the PWD department to the state government has estimated that Rs 5.84 lakh expenditure was expected on repair of the bungalow.

A notice was likely to be sent to Akhilesh asking him to pay for the damage to UP estate department, sources here said.

The report also said that around Rs 4.5 crore had been spent on renovating the bungalow and constructing additional rooms during Akhilesh Yadav's regime.

The state government had asked the PWD department to assess the damage caused to the bungalow after Akhilesh had vacated it.

TV channel footage had then shown damaged floors, huge holes in the walls and roof. The badminton court, swimming pool and gym were also in shambles. The officials had also alleged that some furniture and other items, which were government property, had been taken away.

Charges rubbished

The SP leaders, however, rubbished the charges saying that the inventory was part of a conspiracy to malign Akhilesh and to divert the attention of the people from the failures of the present Yogi-Adityanath-led BJP government.

Akhilesh had said that he would pay for damage if any.