Gangster Tito link: Odisha BJP Executive member appears before crime branch

Cuttack: Odisha BJP State Executive member Bhuban Mohan Jena today deposed before the Special Task Force of the Crime Branch in connection with his alleged links with arrested gangster Tito alias Sayed Usman Ali.

Jena was summoned to depose before the probe agency on his alleged role in allotment of a petrol pump to Tito in Kendrapara and the ad hoc dealership of COCO franchise in Paradip in the name of the gangster's wife Benazir Bibi.

Meanwhile, protesting the summons to the BJP leader, some party workers staged a demonstration before the Crime Branch office.

On the other hand, Bhuban Mohan Jena and his counsel & senior BJP leader Pitambar Acharya severely criticized the Crime Branch. Lambasting the State government for allegedly using the Crime Branch to intentionally hassle leaders of the Opposition parties and protect criminals in its own flanks, Jena said that the STF is playing the role of an Election Task Force for the ruling-BJD.

“The police who had participated in the Tito-sponsored football match and the engineers who have expanded their assets unethically by receiving favours from the gangster by fixing tenders have never been summoned to appear. The SFT has now become the puppet of the ruling party,” said Jena.

Jena’s counsel, Pitambar Acharya said, “I am sure that the summons issued to my client is at the behest of a powerful bureaucrat of the ‘Third Floor’ because BJD leader Atanu Sabyasachi also has close links with Tito, but the STF has not sent notices to him. While Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan has asked for a CBI probe into Tito case, will CM Naveen dare to hand over Atanu to the central probe agency?”