Rajasthan Police seizes Rs 200-crore worth poll ‘freebies’ since model code kicked in

The Rajasthan Police has seized Rs 200 crore worth of election “freebies” including cash, liquor, narcotics and jewellery since the Model Code of Conduct came into force in the state on October 9, a top official said on Saturday. Leading a team of 12 officers, Inspector General of Police Vikas Kumar has created a ‘STORM CLUB’ to keep a strict vigil across the state to ensure voters are not illegally influenced by the candidates during the campaign for November 25 polls. “So far, we have made recoveries to the tune of Rs 214 crore which includes cash amounting to Rs 25 crore, liquor worth Rs 20 crore and jewellery and gold worth Rs 20 crore,” Kumar, a 2004-batch IPS officer, said. Besides this, he said, drugs worth Rs 60 crore, petrol, diesel and illegally stored fertilizers, meant to influence voters, were also seized in various districts. He said it was a team work of the Rajasthan Police especially the officers manning the war room of ‘STORM CLUB’, an acronym for Supervision, Tracking, Operation, Recordkeeping, Monitoring, Control and Command, Liaison and Unified Base. “This entire work is being done under operation MONACO (Monitoring of Nakas Augmented with Coded Operation). As many as 650 check posts, with unique code and monitoring, have been set up across the state and are under constant monitoring at the war room,” he said. The officer, who is credited with unearthing a fake arms licensing scam in Jammu and Kashmir during a probe of underworld activities in Rajasthan, said some illegal arms and ammunition were also recovered during the vigil that has been initiated in the poll-bound state on October 9. Kumar, who is at present the Rajasthan police’s nodal officer to the Election Commission for expenditure monitoring, said the department has initiated certain schemes for rewarding the officers or naka party for the seizures. “We have registered several cases for the seizures done as all of them were meant for election campaigning in the state,” he said. Rajasthan will be going to polls on November 25. The seizure of “freebies” during the last assembly elections in the state amounted to Rs 65 crore.