Rajyavardhan Singh Parmar knows how to stay in the limelight as the chief of an obscure Hindutva outfit – the Maharana Pratap Sena. Be it with his claims about the Hindu roots of Mughal monuments or his support to BJP MP Brij Bhushan Singh over the wrestlers’ protest. But the reason why he has been in the headlines this week is more bizarre.
Parmar was arrested this week, three days after a woman accused him of sexually assaulting her at the Uttar Pradesh Bhavan – a prominent state guest house in Delhi – after calling her to the spot on the pretext of setting up a meeting with union ministers for her film project.
How Parmar managed to book a room, which is usually reserved for bureaucrats and ministers, is now the subject of an official inquiry in UP. Three officials have been suspended and room number 122 sealed for a forensic probe.
However, what is not under inquiry is the fact that Parmar has been living in Lutyens Delhi’s Vithalbhai Patel House for two years with his wife and two children – the allotment of flats at VP House is typically reserved for MPs and ex-MPs and it needs the approval of the Lok Sabha Secretariat.
It took three days for the Delhi Police to arrest Parmar, who comes from UP’s Hardoi district, from Ujjain in Madhya Pradesh. The Maharana Pratap Sena chief, meanwhile, continued to go live on Facebook to assert his side of the story, telling Newslaundry earlier that he had not received any notice or communication from Delhi Police until Tuesday night and whatever he had heard was only through the media.
Fake threat
Parmar often appears on news channels with his communal remarks, explaining the position of the shady outfit he claimed to have formed – in 2014 and registered in 2019 – on polarising issues.
Be it his appearance on News 24 to assert his outfit’s odd claim on the Taj Mahal, or on ETV Bharat about Qutub Minar, or on ABP News about making religious education part of school curriculum, or on India News to support Nupur Sharma, or on Republic TV to slam the Congress over a controversy around President Droupadi Murmu.
The live videos he posted on Facebook over a month were all centred around anti-minority and pro-Hindutva content, and include repeated claims on the Ajmer Chishti shrine being an Ekling mandir, Qutub Minar being a Vishnu stambh and the Taj Mahal being a Teju Mahal. His recent social media posts back Brij Bhushan Singh and controversial film The Kerala Story.
In several videos, he claimed that he had received threatening calls from either a “jihadi” or Pakistan, rebuking the local police for not taking these “threats” seriously. Newslaundry spoke to police officials about Parmar’s repeated claims. Officials said he was initially given a PSO but the special cell found his claims to be false during a threat assessment.
In a video on May 17, Parmar claimed to have received a threat from don-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari. “If anything happens to me or my family, SHO Attar Singh would be responsible,” he said, complaining that the personal security officer assigned to his security detail was a Muslim. “Interesting thing is that the local SHO deputed Saddam Hussain...a Muslim on duty as my PSO. My slogan is mazaar-free India, love jihad-free India and drug-free India, and the gentleman (SHO) is deputing a jihadi…as my PSO.”
A fraud in disguise of Hindutva fringe?
A day before Parmar’s arrest, Newslaundry visited the Vithalbhai Patel House in Delhi’s Rafi Marg, just behind the Reserve Bank of India. The security guard at the building said that house number 219 is Parmar’s residence while the househelp present at the accommodation said the family had been out of town for two days to attend a wedding.
According to documents seen by Newslaundry, flat number 219 has been originally allotted to Apna Dal MP Pakauri Lal Kol since 2020. In a letter dated September 26, 2020, MP Kol had written to the President of Lok Sabha Awas Committee seeking a guest accommodation for AT Nana Patil, a former BJP MP from Maharashtra. The letter sought a temporary residence for Patil’s wife and mother, stating that they were in need of an accommodation in Delhi for their medical treatment in the capital.
In another letter dated March 11, 2021, the Lok Sabha secretariat informed MP Kol that his guest accommodation at flat number 219 has been extended till June 2021 on “payment of the market price of licence fee”.
On February 8, 2021, Parmar’s wife, Sucheta Raj, had taken a gas connection from Indraprastha Gas Agency with the address as flat number 219. Twenty days later, she also bought a car with the same address.
Newslaundry reached out to Nana Patil, who maintained that he was not aware of any flat allotted to him at VP House. Newslaundry also tried to contact MP Kol but we are yet to receive a response. Newslaundry also did not receive a response from the Estate Department of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs.
Parmar’s proximity to power is indicated by his social media account where he often posts photographs with politicians such as Union ministers Rajnath Singh, Kaushal Kishore and Hardeep Singh Puri, and UP ministers Keshav Prashad Maurya and Jagadambika Pal, among others.
In one of his social media posts, Parmar claimed to be the Delhi in-charge of the Kaushal Kishore-led Nasha Mukt Samaj Andolan–Abhiyan Kaushal Ka, but the organisers said they don’t have any in-charge for Delhi. “Crores of people are engaged in this movement. We don’t know who this Parmar is,” a member of the organisation told Newslaundry.
Parmar has several cases of fraud against him. He is out on bail in a case – under IPC sections 419 (cheating), 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) and 406 IPC (criminal breach of trust) – that dates back to 2011.
According to documents seen by Newslaundry, his wife Sucheta has also been accused in a case investigated by the Delhi Police’s economic offences wing since 2019. This case pertains to “cheating, misusing national emblem and misappropriation of funds”. The case was against a company named Kamla Milk Jaivik Khad Limited where Sucheta was a director. Registered in Kanpur in 2014, the company’s present directors include Parmar himself.
Newslaundry found that the employees of the company had filed a case against Parmar back in 2019 under charges of cheating, outraging the modesty of women, and criminal intimidation. However, the employees later withdrew the case through an affidavit saying that Parmar had promised the employees to pay their dues by demand draft and hence there was no need to proceed with the case.
Those who know Parmar for a long time claim that he has conned many people over the past few years under the pretext of jobs or business. “He cheated so many people. He even did not return over Rs 60 lakh to me,” alleged Amit Kumar, another director of Kamla Milk Jaivik Khad Limited. Kumar claimed that Parmar was also in Tihar jail between December 2019 and March 2020 in connection with a case filed by the economic offences wing.
Newslaundry tried to speak to the Delhi police over the ongoing investigation against Parmar but they refused to comment on the matter.
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