A day after Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) member Sudheendra Kulkarni was arrested for being the mastermind behind the cash-for-vote-scam, senior party leaders L K Advani, also his mentor, and Arun Jaitley met him in Tihar Jail here. They claimed 19 Members of Parliament (MPs) had either cross-voted or abstained during the 2008 trust vote and there were open allegations of use of money power.
This was not the first time that senior leaders of BJP went to Tihar Jail to meet arrested party members. Apart from Advani and Jaitley, Sushma Swaraj, leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Shivraj Singh Chauhan, chief minister of Madhya Pradesh, and state party president Prabhat Jha had also went to Tihar to meet MPs Faggan Singh Kulaste and Mahavir Bhagore, arrested earlier this month. Kulkarni was arrested yesterday when he appeared before a local court. The court had threatened to issue an arrest warrant after Kulkarni failed to appear before it twice.
“Nineteen MPs had either cross-voted or abstained during the trust vote and there were open allegations of use of money power to influence MPs. False entrapment cannot co-exist with bribery and whistle-blower cannot be treated in the same manner as bribe givers,” said Arun Jaitley, leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha.
According to the Delhi Police, Kulkarni, along with members of Samajwadi Party, had tried to influence the 2008 trust vote of UPA-I government after he could not influence MPs of the Congress party. The police claim Kulkarni had masterminded a sting operation of Samajwadi Party members, with a promise to pay a total of Rs 3 crore.
Claiming Bhagore, Kulaste and MP Ashok Argal were whistle-blowers in the cash-for-vote-scam, Jaitley said the money was brought inside the Lok Sabha during the trust vote because according to the Supreme Court’s judgement, MPs must inform Parliament of any such acts.
“The Delhi Police has accepted prima facie bribe was paid. Our MPs were only involved in exposing bribe givers as whistle-blowers. During the 2008 trust vote, there were allegations of use of money power to save the UPA government. Their intention was not to take money. They had exposed the act in the Lok Sabha,” Jaitley said.
Meanwhile, Rajya Sabha MP Amar Singh would again be arrested, as a local court dismissed his regular, as well as interim, bail pleas in the scam. Singh was accused of paying the bribe to the three BJP MPs.