Taking animosity to next level, thus making washout of winter session now a certainty, main Opposition Congress on Wednesday demanded constitution of a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) to look into irregularities in Delhi District Cricket Association (DDCA) and resignation of Union finance minister Arun Jaitley, who happens to be a former president of the cricket body. Jaitley, however, dismissed the allegations, saying they are without any basis.
Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday had attempted to link the CBI raid on his secretariat to the DDCA enquiry report and other related files. He had proposed to order a commission of inquiry into the report of the committee to go into the cricket affairs.
In a virtual tit-for-tat, Congress launched an attack on Jaitley and the affairs of the DDCA, claiming it was a Section 25 non-profit company, and could not divert its funds to non-cricketing activities, as alleged in the committee report. Jaitley had levelled almost similar allegations over the National Herald affairs, implicating Congress president Sonia Gandhi and vice-president Rahul Gandhi for diverting funds from a Section 25 company, without proper authorisation.
Flanked by Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad and party leader in Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, senior spokesman Ajay Maken said that pending the completion of inquiry through a JPC, Jaitley must step down. He also accused the Delhi chief minister of sitting on a three-member committee report for over a month now. The chief minister had on November 12 asked a three-member committee to go into the DDCA affairs within three days. He wanted to know why Kejriwal did not proceed to take action by registering a first information report or writing to the Delhi High Court for a court-monitored CBI inquiry.
Maken said four persons in the DDCA, who have been "known for their proximity" to Jaitley, have been named as "officers in default" by the Registrar of Companies in his order of August last year. "How can a fair probe into the issue be possible as long as Jaitley is the finance minister with corporate affairs portfolio as well," he wondered.
Maken noted that virtually all enforcement authorities – ED, IT, Revenue intelligence, Serious Fraud Investigation Office – directly report to Jaitley. "The same agencies are supposed to take action against DDCA for infraction of various rules and norms of the Companies Act and under criminal law," he said.
Maken, who has earlier been sports minister at the Centre, said the Registrar of Companies has "proved" the charges of irregularities after he had complained to the then corporate affairs minister M Veerappa Moily, who had ordered the ROC inquiry. He said the investigation by the Serious Fraud Investigation Officer had found that the reconstruction of the Ferozshah Kotla stadium was carried out between 2002 and 2007 which saw an escalation of costs by Rs 90 crore. He said the initial budget was Rs 24 crore but eventually it went up to Rs 114 crore.
Maken claimed that it was also revealed by SFIO probe that there was no record of tender for most of the contracts issued by the DDCA for the construction of the stadium. He said the report found that many companies that were given contracts were actually owned by the office bearers of the DDCA.
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