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After months of drawing flak from the Opposition over the pace of investigation in the alleged Mahadev Online Book betting racket, the state’s Vishnu Deo Sai government has decided to transfer probe to the CBI. State’s home minister Vijay Sharma said a total of 71 cases — 70 lodged at various police stations in Chhattisgarh and one case with the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) — are being handed over to the CBI. “For few days, there was some discussion in the state, and various conversations were taking place as to why this or that was not happening. It became an issue of more than one state and its main leaders were abroad. Keeping all this in mind, all these cases have been handed over to CBI… Now, the CBI will seriously investigate it and stringent action will be taken and those sitting abroad will be brought back,” he said. The alleged scam was a major election plank for BJP in last year’s Assembly polls. In its FIR registered in the case this March, the state’s Economic Offences Wing (EOW) named 20 people, including former CM Bhupesh Baghel and alleged kingpins Sourabh Chandrakar (28) and Ravi Uppal (43). Chandrakar and Uppal, both from Bhilai, are allegedly main promoters of Mahadev Online Book and are currently believed to be based in Dubai. Baghel, meanwhile, had called the FIR against him “politically motivated”. In an Instagram post in June, Baghel seemingly mocked the ruling establishment by pointing out that the app was still operational. “Mahadev App is also functional in Narendra Modi ’s ‘Guarantee’ and Vishnu Deo Sai ’s ‘Good Governance’. CM, has there been any brainstorming on increasing the revenue through Mahadev App in ‘Chintan Shivir’? Now even government employees are gambling under the good governance of Vishnu Deo,” he said. This came two months after the former CM, in a video statement, accused the current dispensation of having taken “donation” from the company running the app. “When I was in power, we registered FIR and took action. How much donation has the double engine sarkar taken? The Mahadev app is running in the entire country,” Baghel’s statement said. Click here to join The Indian Express on WhatsApp and get latest news and updates None
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