IT dept. serves notice to Munde over poll spending

BJP’s deputy leader in the Lok Sabha is already facing an Election Commission show cause notice over his remark

Close on the heels of receiving an >Election Commission show cause notice , senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader Gopinath Munde received a notice from the Income Tax (I-T) department,, asking him to explain his poll expenses during the 2009 Lok Sabha election.

Read: >Munde’s poll expenses: how the cookie crumbled

Sources close Mr. Munde told The Hindu that Mr. Munde, an MP from Maharashtra’s Beed district, had been asked to reply to the I-T department notice within a week.

In the notice, the department sought an explanation from Mr. Munde on his claim of having spent Rs. 8 crore while campaigning during the election. In 2009, the poll expenses limit for a Lok Sabha constituency in Maharashtra was Rs. 25 lakh and Rs. 10 lakh for an Assembly constituency.

This limit was later raised in February 2011 to Rs. 40 lakh for a Lok Sabha constituency and Rs. 16 lakh for an Assembly constituency in bigger States such as Maharashtra.

BJP cries conspiracy

While Mr. Munde was unavailable for comment, the BJP alleged that the series of notices issued by government agencies were a conspiracy hatched by the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), especially NCP chief Sharad Pawar and his nephew Ajit Pawar, against Mr. Munde.

“The Congress and the NCP are misusing government agencies and using them against Mr. Munde as they lack the capacity to respond politically to such incidents,” BJP spokesman Madhav Bhandari told The Hindu.

Mr. Bhandari said that Mr. Munde would give a detailed, legal explanation to the notices issued by the EC as well as the I-T department.