TURA: Meghalaya BJP vice president Bernard Marak has been sent to six more days in police custody.
Meghalaya BJP vice president has been in police custody since the last week of July.
On Wednesday, the court of Tura chief judicial magistrate (CJM) sent the Meghalaya BJP vice president to six more days in police custody.
Following his arrest, Bernard Marak was first sent to 14-day police remand on allegations of running a prostitution racket from his farmhouse near Tura in West Garo Hills district of Meghalaya.
After completion of his stay in police custody, the Meghalaya BJP leader was then sent to judicial custody.
However, that relief for Meghalaya BJP vice president lasted for only a couple of hours as the police re-arrested him in a case related to recovery of explosive from his farmhouse.
Subsequently, Bernard Marak was again sent to police custody by the court.
On Wednesday, the Meghalaya police pleaded for another eight days of custody of the BJP leader in the explosives recovery case.
However, the court granted a six-day remand to the police.
On July 28, substantial quantity of explosives was recovered from the infamous farmhouse of Bernard Marak, which was also allegedly used by the Meghalaya BJP leader as a ‘brothel’.
The recovery was made by a team of Meghalaya police from a “secret chamber” at the farmhouse of Bernard Marak.
The recovered items consist of: 35 gelatin sticks, 100 detonators, four cross-bows and 15 arrows.
Meanwhile, the Meghalaya police has claimed that it has tracked down a couple of crores of unaccounted money in the bank accounts of arrested Meghalaya BJP vice president Bernard Marak.
The bank accounts of Meghalaya BJP vice president Bernard Marak have already been freezed following his arrest and investigation into the allegations of him running a prostitution racket from his farmhouse near Tura in West Garo Hills district of Meghalaya.
“The money in the accounts amount to a couple of crores and are unaccounted. He (Bernard Marak) has failed to provide credible explanation about the money,” SP of West Garo Hills district of Meghalaya VS Rathore said.
He added: “There have been regular deposits of cash in these bank accounts that continued over a long period of time.”
Meanwhile, the Meghalaya police also informed that although Bernard Marak, a former rebel, had been claiming that the surrendered ANVC-B militants didn’t receive government’s rehab packages, he himself received the rehabilitation amount of Rs 1.5 lakh in 2018.
Moreover, the now arrested Meghalaya BJP vice president Bernard Marak also received Rs 50 lakh from the government as land compensation for his land at Daren Agal area.
Bernard Marak had set up his base camp of the militant organisation ANVC-B at the land in Daren Agal.
It was raided by the police following a bomb blast at a petrol station.