Thaindian News

Panaji, Dec 27 (IANS) Setting a new ‘benchmark’ for probity in politics, All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary B.K. Hariprasad Monday said any Congressman with murder charges against him will be immediately sacked from the party. Hariprasad, who is the AICC general secretary in charge of Goa, was speaking to reporters at the chief minister’s residence here and discussing the logic of why Mickky Pacheco, a controversial Nationalist Congress party (NCP) legislator, was being kept out of the state cabinet, despite express instructions of NCP boss and union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar.

“Anyone with a murder charge will be sacked from the party in no time. Mickky is accused in the killing of a woman. It is a very serious matter,” Hariprasad said.

Mickky, has a string of criminal cases against him ranging from bigamy, assault and extortion. He was forced to resign from the cabinet in June this year, after he was linked to the death of his alleged lover Nadia Torrado, who allegedly committed suicide by consuming rat poison.

Mickky was also suspected of illegal trafficking and money laundering by the US government’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security, which has formally asked the central government to probe him.

The Congress official, however, shied away from questions from the media about sitting Congress legislator and education minister Atanasio Monserrate, who also faces a string of criminal charges, including one filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), for criminally assaulting policemen and leading a mob to attack a police station.

“There are political charges and there are criminal charges. They are two different things,” Hariprasad said.

Education Minister Monserrate has more than half a dozen criminal cases against him ranging from assault, extortion and forgery.