New Delhi, Mar 17 (ANI): Reacting on the latest expose by whistle blowing website WikiLeaks that the Congress party had paid huge sums of money to lawmakers to win a confidence vote in Parliament in 2008, Siddharth Varadarajan, Strategic Affairs Editor of 'The Hindu', on Thursday said the report could not be a 'concocted' allegation.
"The WikiLeaks cables consist of confidential secret cables that American embassies around the world have sent to their headquarters, the state department. These cables have been drafted by Ambassadors, by Deputy Ambassadors and they are not meant for public distribution, they were meant for personal, confidential consumption in Washington," Varadarajan told the Asian News International (ANI).
"So, why would a US ambassador invent fictional details of a discussion, or a conversation or a transaction? I think this is the question the Congress party needs to answer, it is highly unlikely that in a cable that was never meant to be leaked they would concoct an allegation of this kind, wherein Congress party functionaries are talking about showing money that is supposed to be used for bribing MPs in the confidence motion," he added.
According to the WikiLeaks disclosure, an aide of Congress leader Satish Sharma had told a US diplomat that the party had paid crores to several lawmakers to ensure that they voted for the deal in Parliament.
In a cable dated July 17, 2008 sent to the US State Department, Charge d'Affaires Steven White wrote about a conversation that the embassy's political counsellor had with Rajya Sabha MP Satish Sharma.
Varadarajan further said that a proper investigation is required to understand the issue.
"In the cable, it is interesting that Nachiketa Kapur is quoted as saying that the problem is not money, he says that 10 crore has been given to each of the MPs, the problem is not money, the problem is how to ensure that those MPs would take the money, actually deliver their vote on the floor of the house," said Varadarajan.
"Somewhere on the line obviously things didn't work out, why they didn't work out, whether the money was indeed paid or not, whether more money was paid by somebody else, these are issues that really have to be investigated by the police," he added.
Expressing his concern on the money-changing tactics exposed in the cable, Varadarajan said: "Whether this is evidence of the BJP's corruption or not I don't know, but equally, people are saying that there cross voting happened on both sides. Many people, who should have voted for the UPA, voted against, many people who should have voted against the UPA, voted for it."
"So, it is possible that money changed hands on both sides. And I think this is against something that income tax and police and CBI preferably with the Supreme Court's supervision need to probe," he added.
Highlighting that the cable did not implicate the Prime Minister, Varadarajan maintained the government needed to come clean on certain disturbing irregularities observed in the case.
"Prime Minister is not directly linked to any of this cash transaction, and the cable doesn't say so, nor do the two Congress people who have discussed, nor do they make this allegation. What Satish Sharma does say, which is a little bit uncomfortable for the party that the Prime Minister was involved in approaching some Chatwal, who they describe as an America based financier in order to get the Akali Dal to support the UPA," said Varadarajan.
"I think this is something which is a little bit irregular especially in the light of the fact that some Chatwal later gains some Padma Bhushan by this government, a highly controversial decision that was taken last year," he added. By Naveen Kapoor (ANI)
|
|
Comments:
