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VVIP chopper scam: Kejriwal says Modi is scared of arresting Sonia

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arvind-kejriwal

New Delhi: Launching an attack on the Narendra Modi government and the Congress on the AgustaWestland VVIP chopper scam, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday said the Prime Minister does not have “enough courage” to arrest Sonia Gandhi and that the two parties have an “alliance in corruption“.

Questioning the Congress on the issue of PM’s alleged “fake” degree, Mr. Kejriwal said the two parties had a “setting” that the BJP government will not arrest Ms. Gandhi in the chopper scam and the Congress will not raise the matter of Mr. Modi’s educational qualification.

“The Italian court order also has names of Sonia Gandhi, Ahmed Patel, certain officers and Congressmen, but Modi is not able to gather enough courage to arrest Sonia Gandhi, to ask her even two questions, to interrogate her…

“Modiji you have been made PM to take action not to leave the task for Italy court…Our chest would also be of 56 inch if you would have sent her to jail…when my PM says that Italy’s court is taking Gandhi’s name and not him….I want to ask Modiji why are you scared of her?” Mr. Kejriwal said, addressing a rally at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi.

Questioning the progress of the investigation in the chopper deal, Mr. Kejriwal alleged that there hasn’t been an “inch” of movement on the probe, despite the Modi government coming to power on the assurances that the corrupt will be taken to task.

“What investigation did they do in AgustaWestland case in two years? The Italian government completed investigation, filed the cases in court, judgment came and those who were involved in paying bribe were sent to jail.”

“When Anna agitation started, people wanted to change the government… they knew that both Congress and BJP are two sides of the same coin, but Modiji gave such wonderful speeches before Lok Sabha polls that people’s hopes were build that corruption will end,” Mr. Kejriwal said.

Noting that during the poll campaigns, Mr. Modi said that he will take action against Congress president’s son-in-law Robert Vadra for alleged irregularities in the land deal, but despite being in power for two years, and having state governments in Haryana and Rajasthan, he (Mr. Vadra) hasn’t been interrogated even once.

“Modi had said that the corrupt will be sent to jail. It has been two years and not a single person has been sent to jail…the country has been cheated and hence we had to again gather against their ‘alliance’ four years after we had gathered at the same place to protest the corruption of these two parties,” he said.

Mr. Kejriwal said while the CBI raided his office, it could not even interrogate Mr. Vadra.

“They got a CBI raid conducted on me but could not get anything beyond four mufflers in a day long raid. But there is no raid on Sonia Gandhi. Why is Modi scared of her? Before elections he used to say Vadra is Congress’ son-in-law, now it looks like even Modi has adopted him.

“The papers of his (Mr. Vadra’s) land scam are lying in Rajasthan. They have government in Haryana, Rajasthan and Centre. What are they waiting for? Why is there no action against him? CBI hasn’t called him even once because Modi doesn’t have courage.

“You arrest her, interrogate her for two days, the truth will come out automatically.

“Amit Shah says Soniaji please you tell us who who all took bribe. Manohar Parrikar says Soniaji you please tell who all have taken bribe. Is any interrogation conducted like this? If you would have told earlier that you both (Congress and BJP) were hand in glove nobody would have voted for you,” Mr. Kejriwal said.

He said that both parties possessed “secrets” of each other and claimed that the details of Mr. Modi’s degrees were given to them by Congress leaders from Gujarat, who were not “permitted” to raise the issue earlier by the Gandhi family.

“There is a very good setting. Modi has assured Congress that he will just abuse them but not arrest Gandhi in Agusta issue and Sonia Gandhi has assured him that his degree’s issue will not be raised by Congress.

“UPA was in power for 10 years and during those years they have kept secrets of Modi’s all scams. Modi knows that if Gandhi is arrested, Vadra is arrested, his secrets will also be in public domain,” he said.

Raising the degree issue once again, Mr. Kejriwal said the country will continue to respect him if he accepted that his degree was “fake”, but people will not tolerate fraud and forged degrees.

He said his party MLAs were arrested over trivial issues and demanded that Mr. Modi should also be treated like former Delhi Law Minister Jitendra Singh Tomar, who was arrested in an alleged fake degree row.

“His one such secret is his degree. He said in his affidavit that he did BA from DU and MA from Gujarat. I am not saying you need to be educated to be PM, people without degrees can also be talented….If he is 12th pass, we have no issues…if he says that the country would still respect him…but if he does cheating and fraud, forged degrees, country will not tolerate,” he said.

Over 300 AAP supporters detained

Over 300 AAP supporters and some party leaders were on Saturday detained as they on Saturday took out a protest march towards the residence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi alleging a BJP-Congress alliance in corruption.

Following a rally at Jantar Mantar, where Mr. Kejriwal and its top brass attacked Mr. Modi and his government, groups led by Sanjay Singh and Kumar Vishwas went to gherao residences of the Prime Minister and the Congress president.

Mr. Kejriwal left the venue before the protest march began.

Several AAP MLAs, including Deputy Speaker of the Delhi Legislative Assembly Bandana Kumar, participated in it.

Police, which had made extensive preparations by putting up three layers of barricades, detained senior AAP leaders Ashutosh, Mr. Sanjay Singh, Dilip Pandey along with party volunteers, and took them to Parliament Street police station.

“Over 300 people were detained from the first layer of barricade in Parliament Street as they started their march from Jantar Mantar. And over 100 were detained in the morning. They were a separate group who had reached near Tughlaq Road police station, which is near the PM’s residence, to protest.

“The protesters were detained under Section 144 of CrPC. They have all been taken to Parliament Street police station,” DCP, New Delhi, Jatin Narwal said.

(Agencies)

AgustaWestland case: CBI questions ex-IAF chief SP Tyagi

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Tyagi

New Delhi: CBI on Monday questioned former IAF chief SP Tyagi in connection with alleged corruption in the Rs 3,600-crore AgustaWestland VVIP chopper deal.

Tyagi arrived at CBI headquarters at around 10 am for questioning.

The Milan Court of Appeals, equivalent of an Indian High Court, has given details of how alleged bribes were paid by helicopter-maker Finmeccanica and AgustaWestland to Indian officials through middlemen to clinch the deal.

The order mentions Tyagi’s name at several points. CBI had registered a case against Tyagi along with 13 others including his cousins and European middlemen in the case.

The allegation against the former Air Chief was that he had reduced flying ceiling of the helicopter from 6,000m to 4,500m (15,000ft) so that AgustaWestland was included in the bids.

However, this decision was reportedly taken in consultation with the officials of SPG and the Prime Minister’s Office including then NSA M K Narayanan.

CBI has alleged that the reduction of the service ceiling, maximum height at which a helicopter can perform normally, allowed the UK-based firm to get into the fray as otherwise its helicopters were not even qualified for submission of bids.

CBI, which has received a copy of the Milan court order, has now prepared a fresh set of questionnaire to put to Tyagi.

Tyagi has denied allegations against him and has claimed that the decision to reduce the ceiling was taken by a group of senior officials.

The agency had already questioned Tyagi but this session is the first after the Italian court order. His cousins have also been called by the agency.

(Agencies)

Italian chopper firm had allotted Rs 50 cr to ‘manage’ media

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AgustaWestland

New Delhi: BJP today raised the AgustaWestland issue in Lok Sabha, expressing concern over the reported misuse of media by the Italian company which had earmarked Rs 50 crore for the purpose to clinch the VVIP chopper deal.

Raising the issue during zero hour, Meenakshi Lekhi suggested that the middleman Christian Michel had been given the amount to ‘manage’ the media.

Amid strong protests from Congress for allowing raising the issue, Lekhi said it was unfortunate that media which is an organ of healthy democracy has been “misused”.

“It amounts to misuse of the freedom of expression. It is irresponsible as media is part of democratic structure”, she remarked.

Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge, supported by party colleagues, protested to Speaker Sumitra Mahajan. “I respect you much. You should not have allowed this.

Please don’t do this”, he was heard remarking.

Amid the protests, the Speaker adjourned the House for the lunch recess.Reports had it Christian Michel, a British businessman and an alleged middleman in the deal, was paid millions of dollars by AgustaWestland.

A large portion of the money paid by AgustaWestland to Michel is “completely disproportionate” to the work he did for the company, the Milan Court of Appeals has held. Interpol issued a red corner notice against Michel on India’s request in December 2015.

The Milan court had noted that Michel was paid over 44 million euros by AgustaWestland for various contracts, which included a deal to supply spare parts for Indian naval helicopters and a post-contract service deal for the VVIP chopper contract.

(PTI)

‘I am not afraid’, says Sonia Gandhi on AgustaWestland deal

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Sonia Gandhi

New Delhi: Congress President Sonia Gandhi today rejected as “baseless” allegations linking her and party leaders to bribes in the AgustaWestland chopper deal and said she is not “afraid” of being “cornered” on the issue.

She asked the government what it has been doing in power for the last two years on the issue and demanded that the ongoing inquiry be completed impartially.

“I am not afraid of anyone cornering me as there is no basis to that. All the accusations they are throwing at us are false,” Gandhi told reporters in Parliament complex as BJP sought to target her onTHE DEAL .

“Where are the proofs. They are lying. They are part of a strategy of character assassination which we have known these people indulge in,” Gandhi said.

Referring to the Modi government, Gandhi asked what has it been doing over the last two years.

“The government is there for the last 2 years. What are they doing? Inquiry is there, why don’t they complete it? Complete it as soon as possible, impartially,” she added.

Gandhi’s political secretary and senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel also rubbished the allegations against him and the party as “absolutely baseless.”

“This government, when they are saying all these things outside and inside the Parliament, why can’t they investigate,” Patel said.

“If there is something against me, they should find out and they should hang me,” he said when asked by reporters for his reactions over the allegations.

The comments of Sonia Gandhi and Patel come in the backdrop of BJP move to target the Congress President and other party leaders on the issue of bribes in the AugustaWestland chopper deal during the UPA regime in a bid to corner the main opposition party which has been paralysing Rajya Sabha on the Uttarakhand affair.

BJP today sought an explanation from Congress, while the opposition party hit back, asking why the Modi government had cancelled the process of blacklisting the firm in question.

Attacking Congress, Environment and Forests Minister Prakash Javadekar said that what has been revealed in Agusta Westland case is “very important and very serious” and that Congress owes an explanation.

He said that instead of disrupting Parliament, Congress should introspect on what “they have done to the country and explain what is the role of their leaders” in the case.

Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi also targeted Congress, saying that those accused ofPAYING bribes are in jail, but the alleged recipients are blocking the progress of the country.

There should be a discussion on the matter so that facts can come out in the open, he said.

BJP is expected to raise the issue in Parliament. Congress has been paralysing proceedings in Rajya Sabha over the imposition of President’s rule in Uttarakhand.

Top BJP leaders had met yesterday to chalk out a strategy following reports that an Italian court, which has convicted AgustaWestland chief Giuseppe Orsi, has described how the firm paid bribes to certain Congress leaders to bag the Rs 3,600 crore deal.

Congress Spokesperson Randeep Surjewala, however, hit back, saying that if anybody needs to answer questions on the matter it is the Modi government.

He said the UPA governement had included an integrity clause as per which the contract for purchase of helicopters from Agusta Westland was cancelled, the guarantee forfeited and process initiated for recovery ofMONEY .

Surjewala said that the money too was recovered and “not a singleRUPEE loss was caused to the Government of India.”

He said that the UPA government had also ordered a CBI inquiry as well as initiating the process of blacklisting Agusta Westland.

“On the contrary, as the government changed in May 2014, Modiji proceeded to cancel the process of blacklisting Agusta Westland. Why did Modiji not blacklist Agusta Westland?” Surjewala asked.

(Agencies)

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