Ajit Jogi

Bhopal/Raipur, March 18: Destiny took another turn for Congress MP Ajit Jogi when Raipur police came looking for him in poll-bound Gandai at Rajnandgaon tonight and arrested him in connection with the murder of NCP treasurer Ram Avtar Jaggi four years ago.

Raipur SP B.S. Marawi said he was acting on a local court’s directive. The court had issued the arrest warrant on March 16 on a plea by Jaggi’s son Satish, after Jogi failed to appear before it despite repeated notices.

“I had filed an FIR soon after my father’s murder but under pressure from the then chief minister, Ajit Jogi, his name was dropped. Today I feel vindicated,” Satish said.

The CBI, which is probing the case, was taken by surprise by the arrest with highly placed sources claiming ignorance.

Till late tonight, there was high drama outside the resthouse where the MP from Mahasamund was put under arrest. Wheelchair-bound since a near-fatal accident in May 2004, Jogi suddenly took ill when police approached him and doctors had to be called.

Under the supervision of son Amit (who spent 10 months in custody in the Jaggi murder before being freed on bail in May 2006) and MLA wife Renu, a crowd of over 5,000 raised slogans and tried to obstruct police and district officials from approaching Jogi.

The Chhattisgarh Congress has called a Rajnandgaon bandh tomorrow.

Jogi’s lawyer Hashim Khan asked how he could be implicated in the murder when his son Amit was facing trial for the past four years. “There was no evidence against him then, there is no evidence now,” he said, adding he will seek bail tomorrow.

Former state home minister Nand Kumar Patel asked why the police had kept the warrant a secret. “It reeks of political vendetta.”

Amit pointed at the recent BJP defeat in an Assembly byelection which his mother won by a huge margin. “The state government is rattled by the return of the Congress,” he said.

In Raipur, there were unconfirmed reports of a local rebel Congress leader turning against Jogi and claiming to have “material evidence” against him. Two of the several accused are reported to have turned approvers. They told the court Jogi was involved in the conspiracy to kill Jaggi for political gain. Jaggi, a supporter of Jogi-baiter Vidya Charan Shukla, was shot dead in June 2003.

In recent days, Jogi had made a comeback but his career may now take another course. Accused of bribing BJP MLAs to break away from their party and form an alternative government soon after he was voted out in December 2003, Jogi was suspended from the Congress. It was the shortest suspension in the history of the 121-year-old party as he was back in the Lok Sabha, as the lone Congress MP elected from Chhattisgarh, and the Congress Working Committee in less than four months.