CCTV camera in Palamu village creates flutter ahead of assembly polls in Jharkhand
THE JHARKHAND STORY NETWORK Daltonganj, Oct 15: A CCTV camera installed at village Dhuma under the Panki assembly constituency has led…
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THE JHARKHAND STORY NETWORK
Daltonganj, Oct 15: A CCTV camera installed at village Dhuma under the Panki assembly constituency has led to a war of words ahead of the assembly elections.
Ramperwesh Singh, a highly respected person from the Koeri community lives in this village. He commands respect and his community follows him.
Ramperwesh Singh is a class one contractor and maintains an equal distance from various political parties. He is a non-political fellow but remains aware of the political development.
Here comes in his house at Dhuma the sitting BJP MLA Shashibhushan Mehta who also belongs to the Koeri community. The two are said to have a cordial relation.
Ramperwesh Singh’s house is also visited by Azad Samaj Party of Chandrasekhar Azad’s (the first-time MP from UP) Mumtaz Ahmad Khan, a class one contractor and an arch-rival of the BJP MLA Shashibhushan Mehta this 2024 election. Singh and Mumtaz run together a registered construction firm.
Here enters the third political batsman- a former Congress MLA Devendra Singh alias Bittu Singh.
Bittu Singh is believed to have installed a CCTV camera at a house quite close to Ramperwesh Singh’s house in village Dhuma to watch who comes in or goes out from Ramperwesh Singh’s house. This is the talk of the Dhuma village.
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Concerns over surveillance
Ramperwesh Singh told this correspondent, “There is one CCTV camera installed in the next-door neighbour of mine. It is angled purely towards my house.”
“I wonder the house where this CCTV camera has been installed is still unplastered but it boasts of CCTV camera. The logic behind the CCTV camera is not intelligible to me,” he said.
Singh further said, “It’s a political camera. I know for sure. My neighbour’s house where this CCTV camera is so installed has no purpose for this family”. He ducked the question as to who is behind this installation of the CCTV camera. All that he said, “Don’t drag me into this.”
This correspondent spoke to Azad Samaj Party leader Mumtaz Ahmad Khan to learn more about this political camera.
Allegations of collusion
Mumtaz too echoed the same version saying “It’s political spying. I know for what it is. It has been set up there by Bittu Singh.”
“Recently I went to meet Ramperwesh Singh. He is our firm partner. My visiting him is for our firm business,” reiterated Mumtaz.
“There was sitting BJP MLA Shashibhushan Mehta already in the house of Singh when I reached there,” added Mumtaz.
Asked if his visit to Ramperwesh Singh’s house where he confronted BJP MLA Mehta already sitting there any coincidental or a staged managed affair to which Mumtaz said, “It was all a co-incidence. There was no pre-plan setting. I call upon him frequently as he manages the financial issues of our firm of which he is the most important partner.”
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He said, “The very next day former Congress MLA Bittu Singh (popularly known by this name only) made CCTV camera’s footage viral spreading the political canard about my hobnobbing with the BJP MLA ahead of the election at night.”
“I am set to contest the Panki assembly constituency this Vidhan Sabha election. This political snooping is to tarnish my political image by my rival,” said Mumtaz
Escalating political rivalries
Former Congress MLA Bittu Singh has told a news channel (accessed by this correspondent) that “Mumtaz bhaiya met BJP MLA Mehta secretly at night who has so maligned the Muslim community here in the Panki assembly constituency over the last many months.”
“In the 2019 assembly election, Mumtaz bhaiya had contested this Panki assembly seat as an Independent. But even then, he was a proxy candidate fixed by this sitting BJP MLA Mehta just to defeat me,” Bittu Singh had told the news channel.
Bittu Singh was phoned half a dozen times by this correspondent who didn’t take any of the calls.
However, his closest political aide who manages his electioneering Mithilesh Singh when contacted by this correspondent said, “It’s a political propaganda. There are many rivals of Bittu Singh. Does it mean he will be fixing CCTV cameras at every house near his rival’s house?”
Mithilesh Singh further quipped, “Is this not a fact that Mumtaz met Mehta at night, so secretly? What is wrong if Bittu Singh has raised fingers at this secret meet of the two ahead of the assembly election here?”
“The village Dhuma where this CCTV camera issue has cropped up is always poll unfriendly to our leader Bittu Singh. There are people here who are inventors to the poll manoeuvring like this one of the CCTV cameras,” added Mithilesh Singh.
The family where the political snooping camera is installed declined to speak to the press.
Panki assembly constituency is heading towards a poll battle with issues behind, personalities in the front.
