The Congress hit back at the BJP on October 18 over allegations of Robert Vadra’s links with a fugitive arms dealer, accusing Prime Minister Narendra Modi of making 100 tours within India and abroad on private chartered planes as Gujarat Chief Minister and asking who paid for them.
Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi also accused the BJP of “witchhunt and vendetta” against party chief Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law. Mr. Singhvi, with Gujarat Congress leader Arjun Modhwadia by his side, released a purported list of Mr. Modi’s visits abroad and within the country from 2003 to 2007 when he was Chief Minister and asked who funded those.
The two leaders claimed neither the government nor the BJP paid to private players owning the chartered planes used by Mr. Modi. The details of Mr. Modi’s visits were made available in response to an RTI query, they said, adding ₹16.56 crore was spent on those trips, including ₹3 crore on visits abroad.
The Congress’ allegations against Mr. Modi came in response to the October 17 attack by the BJP on Mr. Vadra and the Congress leadership following a report on Times Now new channel which claimed fugitive arms dealer Sanjay Bhandari paid for plane tickets of Ms. Gandhi’s son-in-law. Based on the media report, the BJP on October 17 fielded Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who mounted a fierce assault on the Congress leadership over alleged “links” that Mr. Vadra had with Mr. Bhandari. The report had claimed Mr. Bhandari booked tickets for Mr. Vadra’s overseas visit in 2012.
“We are raising a question on who spent this ₹16.5 crore. We want to know why a private party spends for a person in a constitutional position. What is the motive?” Mr. Singhvi said. Charging the BJP with indulging in “vendetta politics”, Mr. Singhvi asked Mr. Modi or the BJP to come out with answers to their questions for the “sake of propriety”.
“These trips are clearly trips by a constitutional functionary, position holder. They are provided for by private persons...and we do not have any account. We must have accountability first.
“We are talking of constitutional propriety as somebody was trying to teach us lessons on constitutional propriety yesterday. It is worse than the pot calling the kettle black,” he said.
Mr. Singhvi also accused the Centra and the BJP-ruled Haryana and Rajasthan governments of engaging in a “witch hunt” against Mr. Vadra. “In the last 41 months, the central government and the governments of Haryana and Rajasthan have been indulging in a witch hunt against Vadra. For the last 41 months, they have kept the pot boiling but have not found any proof,” Mr. Singhvi said.
He termed as “baseless” the charges levelled against Mr. Vadra by Ms. Sitharaman based on the media report, which Mr. Vadra’s lawyer has already denied. Mr. Singhvi accused some in media of “selective” reporting and asked them to introspect.
