Panaji: The Anti-Corruption Bureau of Goa grilled AAP's chief ministerial candidate Elvis Gomes yesterday over an alleged land scam that took place when he was working with the state government.
Emerging from the two-hour interrogation session, Gomes, who also heads the Aam Aadmi Party in Goa, denied he was linked to the scam.
He alleged that he was being harassed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government because of the "rapid" strides the AAP was making in Goa, where polls to the legislative assembly are likely to be held early next year.
"I have responded in detail to the questions asked by the ACB during the interrogation... This matter has nothing to do with me.
This is nothing but sheer harassment," Gomes said.
He said calling him, a Catholic, for interrogation on the Boxing Day (the day after Christmas celebrations) also amounted to targeted harassment.
Several hundred AAP volunteers were present outside the ACB office, shouting slogans against the BJP-led state government, as Gomes was being inetrrogated at the agency's Panaji office.
Gomes and former Housing Minister in the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party government Nilkanth Halarnkar were booked under Sections 420 (cheating) and 120-B (criminal conspiracy) in February this year.
Gomes was then a serving bureaucrat. The duo has been accused of scrapping official acquisition procedure for a chunk of land measuring 30,256 sq mts in Margao in South Goa district in 2011.
