CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury on Tuesday stressed that he had not signed any petition requesting the United States to deny Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi a visa, a day after a California-based company said a forensic examination had found that >signatures on the document were original .
Asked about the findings of the forensic examination, Mr. Yechury reiterated to The Hindu that he had not signed any such petition, suggesting that it was likely the case that signatures obtained for an entirely unrelated petition had been appended to the document.
On Monday, DMK MPs similarly argued that they believed their original signatures for an unrelated petition had been attached to the document. Their suggestion was that a forensic examination merely proving the signatures were original was hence far from conclusive.
Speaking to The Hindu in Beijing while in transit from North Korea, Mr. Yechury said he had “already made” his “position on the matter clear.”
The petition, he noted, also did not appear authentic. He said that he had pointed out, in an earlier statement, that “the heading under which some signatures are appended says, ‘Names and Signatures of
Indian MPs’. Which other country’s MPs would sign on the letterhead of the Indian Parliament? This itself suggests some efforts at cut and paste.”
Mr. Yechury was in North Korea as part of a rare official Government of India delegation to the country to attend the 60th anniversary of the armistice agreement that marked an end to the Korean War.
He was accompanied by BJP MP Tarun Vijay and Congress MP Hamdullah Sayeed.
