Prez declares assets worth Rs 2.49 cr

President Pratibha Devisingh Patil does not own a car but has a house and a farmhouse in her native place Amaravati in Maharashtra and her savings include investment in shares and bonds.

Updated on: Jul 26, 2011, 24:22:41 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

President Pratibha Devisingh Patil does not own a car but has a house and a farmhouse in her native place Amaravati in Maharashtra and her savings include investment in shares and bonds.

It is for the first time the President of India has declared his or her assets worth Rs 2.49 crore.

This is as per the declaration of assets by Patil after the Central Information Commission (CIC) advised her to declare assets on lines of similar declaration by those holding posts such as Supreme Court judges and election commissioners.

But, the CIC made it clear that it does not have powers to ask President to declare her assets, while saying that the Prime Minister has declared his assets voluntarily.

Patil was prompt to declare her assets but she did not declare assets of her family members as done by the Union Council of Ministers. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had asked his Cabinet colleagues to declare the assets of their entire family and possible conflict of interest.

The President has declared that she owns a house in 417 sq meters and a farmhouse in Amaravati, where she also has agriculture land. Her husband Devisingh Shekhawat hails from Amaravati. She also has additional agriculture lands in Jalgoan and Shindkhada districts of Maharastra worth Rs 25 lakh.

Among the immovable property, the President has invested in shares of PMS Bank and Pratap Co-op Bank, Sant Sugar Factory and Congress Nagar Housing Society, Amaravati.

She has also invested in bonds of the Central government's Rural Electrification Corporation and has fixed deposits worth Rs 68 lakh in different banks.

Patil does not own any vehicle and owns jewellery worth Rs 31 lakh.

With this, almost everyone in the highest level in the Central government has declared assets including senior bureaucrats and judges. But, it took almost six years after the Right To Information act was passed and that too, after a lot of resistance, especially from judiciary and bureaucrats.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

Catch every big hit, every wicket with Crickit, a one stop destination for Live Scores, Match Stats, Infographics & much more. Explore now!

Stay updated with all top Cities including, Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai and more across India. Stay informed on the latest happenings in World News along with Delhi Election 2025 and Delhi Election Result 2025 Live, New Delhi Election Result Live, Kalkaji Election Result Live at Hindustan Times.