India

Congress demands Amit Shah’s resignation over allegations against son

From left to right: Jay Shah, Amit Shah, Narendra Modi

Raipur: The Congress on Monday demanded a probe monitored by the Supreme Court into a media report which claimed that a company owned by BJP chief Amit Shah’s son Jay Shah saw a huge rise in its turnover after the party came to power at the Centre in 2014.

The report The Golden Touch of Jay Amit Shah‘ was published by The Wire on Sunday. While Jay Shah in his response has filed a defamation case against the editors of the news website.

In its article, ‘The Wire’ had claimed that Jay Shah’s firm Temple Enterprise’s turnover zoomed by around 16,000 times from Rs 50,000 to around Rs 80 crore in 2015-16 after the BJP came to power in 2014.

“Either Amit Shah should immediately step down from his post or he should be relieved from the charge as the party president so that allegations of irregularities leveled against his son Jay Shah’s company could be probed independently,” AICC spokesperson Pawan Khera said in a press conference, the PTI reported.

He further suggested that a commission comprising two sitting judges of the apex court be set up for an independent and credible probe into the matter.

“Modiji had said ‘na khaunga, na khane dunga‘ (will not engage in corruption myself, nor allow others), but now the question is being raised over his party president’s son.

“It is the right of the country’s people to know the truth behind what was claimed in the media report regarding his (Jay’s) company,” Khera said.

He also questioned why a union minister (referring to Railway Minister Piyush Goyal) came out to defend Jay Shah, who is neither a minister in the union cabinet nor a BJP office-bearer, the report said.

Meanwhile, a senior Chhattisgarh minister refuted the charges and dubbed it as “entirely false” and “politically motivated”.

Talking to reporters, Commerce and Industry Minister Amar Agrawal said, “It is evident that the allegations have been leveled in view of the assembly election in Gujarat, which clearly reflects their political motives. It is entirely false and has no facts.”

Meanwhile, senior CPI leader D Raja on Monday demanded a response from Prime Minister Narendra Modi over The Wire‘s report.

He said a probe should be initiated to reveal the truth.

“Why we are not hearing a single word from Prime Minister Narendra Modi regarding allegations against Amit Shah’s son? We want that he should respond to the matter and should constitute a probe to bring out the truth. Let the allegations be probed,” Raja told PTI.

Jay Shah filed a defamation case against the news portal over the report and prayed for, “criminal action against the respondents for defaming and tarnishing the reputation of the complainant through an article, which is scandalous, frivolous, misleading, derogatory, libelous and consisting of several defamatory statements.”

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