 "Demonetisation: BJP rejects Congress charges on buying of land")
Rejecting as "absurd and preposterous" the Congress' charge linking its purchase of land in different places to demonetisation, BJP on Friday said the exercise was part of its chief Amit Shah's decision last year to have a party office in every organisational district.
"It is absurd to allege that the party has started buying properties in view of demonetisation. In the Maha Sampark Abhiyan held in Bangalore on July 5, 2015, party president Amit Shah had emphasised the need of having offices across the country till the grassroots level as our membership was already crossing 10 crore," Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said in a statement.
As part of the expansion programme, Shah had also called for collecting funds for this purpose and establish party offices, he said, adding that the party chief had also urged party workers to contribute generously.
A central committee and sub-committees at state level were formed to give effect to this decision, he said.
"The party and its karyakartas have been working relentlessly for the last 16 months to achieve this. It is preposterous to suggest that a normal activity undertaken by the party as part of its regular and decided agenda to expand at the grassroots levels had anything to do with the demonetisation scheme which has come into effect from November 9, 2016," he said.
He quoted Shah as having said in his speech in Bangalore that "we have taken up work of building party offices. Without a good party office, there can be no expansion of party work within a district. Therefore, we have decided that by December 2016, in every organisational district across the country, we will construct a new party office."
Earlier in the day, Congress and Janata Dal (United) cited purchase of land in different parts of Bihar to allege a scam, saying organisational leaders in the saffron party were informed in advance about the demonetisation decision so that they could use their "unaccounted cash" for this purpose.