M’laya BJP leader accused of running brothel, claims ‘plot to kill him’

Meghalaya BJP vice president Bernard Marak, who has been accused of running a brothel at his farmhouse, on Sunday claimed that there was a plot to get him killed in an encounter by the state police.
“I am not absconding nor evading arrest but I am trying to save myself from being encountered by the state police,” Marak stated in a press statement issued via WhatsApp.
“I sent a mail to Superintendent of Police Tura and DGP stating that I am not absconding nor am I evading arrest. I will co-operate with the investigation once I am back on safe route,” he added. The senior BJP leader, who is also an elected member to the Garo Hills Autonomous District Council (GHADC), confirmed that the Officer-in-Charge of Tura police station spoke to him over the phone on Friday night, when the police team raided his farmhouse, and asked him to surrender at Sadar Police Station in Shillong.
“But the moment I was coming out, two boleros and one gypsy approached me near Bethany Hospital at around 12 midnight and I was pretty sure it was M.K.Singh, IGP (Inspector General of Police) Law and Order . So I hid myself because I had an information earlier of their plan to gun me down,” Marak, who is apparently hiding in Assam’s main city of Guwahati, claimed.
Claiming that Singh and Vivekananda Rathore, the district police chief of West Garo Hills, are “Chief Minister’s close men and have been posted with a purpose as per information from reliable sources”, Marak said, “They were given the task to gun me down and arrest BJP supporters. And the moment I saw Singh, I was sure that they are upto something so I moved out.” “Why would he (Singh) come to where I was holding up and why should I take the risk,” the BJP leader asked, adding that “DGP’s video statement confirmed that they were tracking him in Shillong and Guwahati.
My life is in threat from the goons in the police department so, I moved out that night and I avoided their execution plan.”
Marak, who was leader of the disbanded militant outfit, the breakaway A’chik National Volunteers Council (ANVC-B), also alleged that Singh had gunned down four of his boys in a fake encounter at Darengagal in 2014.
“He (Singh) made many attempts to gun me down when he was SP (Superintendent of Police( of Tura,” Marak alleged.
Alleging that the conspiracy against him was there even after signing of ATS (Agreed Text Settlement , a peace pact signed between ANVC and the government), Marak claimed that the conspiracy grew after he won the election to the GHADC from Chief Minister Conrad Sangma’s Tura seat against his candidate last year.
“The support for BJP grew in Garo Hills which has become a threat to NPP and it’s chief. The raid at my farm was done when I was in Shillong so that I could be preyed out here as they knew I always travelled alone. It was a trap so I had to move out to safety but they were tracking me,” Marak said.
On Friday, Meghalaya police raided the farmhouse of Marak, which was earlier was earlier a designated camp of the disbanded ANVC-B, at Edenbari in West Garo Hills district.
The police claimed that the farmhouse was used as a brothel after a minor victim said in the court she and her friend were taken to farmhouse-Rimpu Bagan- and sexually assaulted there.
During the raid, police found evidence and rescued six minors and arrested 73 people from the farmhouse.
A case under Immoral Trafficking (Prevention) Act, 1956 has been registered against Marak and his accomplices under Tura police station
Police had seized 500 unused contraceptives condom packets, knives, one crossbow barnet with 44 numbers of arrows, several hundred bottles of liquor, an ATM card of Bernard Marak, 49 mobile phones, 36 vehicles, incriminating documents and cash of Rs. 30,000 were seized from the farmhouse.