Munde, who rose from the masses, established himself as a prominent leader of the BJP.
Coming from the Other Backward Classes (OBC), his popularity made him an important part of the BJP (the OBCs are a big vote bank in Maharashtra).
He was set an example for many for having three daughters as Beed, his home district, is notorious for female foeticide.
In 2014, Munde managed to win the Beed seat inspite of trong fight by Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar.
A five-time MLA, Munde was tipped to be BJP’s CM candidate for Maharashtra with assembly elections scheduled to be held later in the year.
A week after taking oath as a Union minister; he was on his way to the airport to go to Maharashtra. Early morning on June 3, 2014, the news of Munde’s car accident came in.
Around 6 am Munde was travelling in his car in Delhi with a driver and his secretary. It was at that time his car, a Maruti Suzuki SX4, was hit by another vehicle at Prithviraj Road-Tughlak Road roundabout.
The other car, an Indica, had reportedly jumped the traffic light and collided with Munde’s car coming from the other side. The Indica hit Munde’s car towards the passenger side where Munde was sitting. ( Picture below)
The crash happened around a kilometre away from PM Narendra Modi’s official residence.
Later, he was brought to the hospital by his driver and assistant. Doctors at AIIMS said that Munde was not breathing when he was brought in.
“Munde was brought to the emergency department by his personal assistant and driver. He was sitting in the back seat of his car which was hit by another car…on the side he was sitting,” a doctor with the AIIMS Trauma Centre had told reporters.
It was later said that Munde died of shock and cardiac arrest suffered during the accident. Both the driver and the secretary were unhurt.
Munde’s postmortem was conducted by a medical board at AIIMS in Delhi. The postmortem report of Gopinath Munde established that his death was caused by a massive heart attack during the car crash.
Munde’s liver was ruptured in the road accident and he suffered a cardiac arrest due to shock, the report said.
There was, however, no major external injury. Later, the Central Bureau of India took over the case and filed a chargesheet against the driver.
The driver was granted bail initially but later a city court decided to not discharge the driver and held that there was “prima facie” evidence to try him for the offences, including rash driving and culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
The death of Gopinath Munde was the second blow for both the BJP and Munde-Mahajan family which had lost Munde’s brother-in-law Pramod Mahajan in 2006.
Like Munde, Mahajan was also at the prime of his political career but was shot dead in 2006.
The death of Gopinath Munde has below chief question unanswered :
1) How Come the other two occupants in the car other than Munde remained unhurt ..
2) Munde had been bought dead as per AIMS doctor statement – An Union Minister is left unattended after a minor accident where even the car glasses were not fond shattered but lead to death Enroute..
3) Why the driver who hit the Minister car given bail on the same day and what role the Delhi Police and government lawyer did standing as witness .
