Arvind Kejriwal today unleashed his ammunition against Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and accused Modi and Congress to be partners in business, with common friends in the industry. While, he admitted that he got much of his evidence from Modi’s bête noire and now Congress ally Sanjeev Bhutt whose wife is to contest elections against Modi on a Congress ticket, Kejriwal said that he was not being their spokesperson. He said the evidence shows that Modi is no better than Congress and that elections are not going to change Gujarat.
The allegations against Modi today ranged from the favours he had allegedly extended to Geo Global Resources Inc and another company Jubilant Enpro Pvt Ltd, both selected without bidding to the favours allegedly given to power company of Adani.
He also accused Modi of silencing dissent by bribing MPs and MLAs of all parties with land, and when the judiciary intervened to stay sale of land given for housing, he allegedly gifted land to judges and silenced it.
Kejriwal today sought to go deeper into the deal between the Gujarat Government oil and gas exploration company the Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation and Geo Global Resources Inc which allegedly involved favours granted to the company at no cost.
While Modi has been defending himself on this charge, Kejriwal today said that GSPC which acquired gas blocks in KG Basin in 2002 entered into agreements with these two companies giving away 10 poer cent of participating interest to each of them completely free of cost.
He said that Geo Global which was supposed to provide technical assistance was incorporated just six days before its agreement with GSPC and on the day of agreement its total capital was only $ 64 or Rs 3200. Kejriwal also raised qestions about its owner Jean Paul Roy. ''A man comes from Canada with just Rs 3200 and in six days finds himself signing a deal of Rs 10,000 crore with the Gujarat Government,. If we dig deep into this, it may yield a scam worse than 2 G spectrum,’’ Kejriwal said.
While Modi has defended his government’s agreement with Geo Global, Kejriwal said that the company has in its admission to Securities and Exchange Commission in US said that it does not have the necessary expertise. Moreover the CAG has raised doubts about the company’s technical competence, he said. In fact CAG has said that the ''technical expertise ‘’ of Geo Global was so flawed that the state government had to hire another technical consultant.
Therefore he said the sole purpose of this transaction was perhaps to gift oil fields worth Rs 10,000 crore and to gift 10% profits of GSPC to Jean Paul Roy.
He further said that GSPC has spent $ 3 billion as cost of exploration. Since Geo Global has 10% stake ,10% of the cost or Rs 1500 crore ($ 300 million) should have been borne by Geo Global. However Modi Government paid this money on their behalf and did not recover it from them, he said at a press conference he addressed with Prashant Bhushan.
Kejriwal showed evidence to prove that UPA Government was also vying with Modi to shower its bounties on Geo Global.
Geo Global in its website says: ''The exploration rights pursuant to PSCs we have entered into with the Government of India are located in the following areas: The Krishna Godavari Basin offshore and onshore in the State of Andhra Pradesh in south eastern India; The Cambay Basin onshore in the State of Gujarat in western India; The Deccan Syneclise Basin onshore in the State of Maharashtra in west central India; and the Bikaner-Nagaur Basin onshore in the State of Rajasthan in north western India. ‘’
According to Kejriwal these contracts were signed under the UPA Government, thus making Jean Paul Roy both Modi’s and Congress’ man.
As further evidence of Congress reluctance to harm Geo Global, they pointed out that Gujarat Government got jittery about Geo Global contract and wanted to annul it. But its request for permission to do so is still pending with Government of India for the last three four years,Kejriwal said adding that Congress has little right to question Modi on Geo Global deal. Again he said that the second company which Modi favoured was owned by the husband of Shobana Bhartiya a close friend of the Congress. Why would Modi shower such favours on a Congress supporter? he asked.
He also accused Modi of extending undue favours to Adani in power agreements. He said that Adani was allowed to sell power at higher rates to Gujarat despite power being offered at a cheaper rate by the Gujarat Mineral Development Corporation. While the GMDC chairman who insisted that he had not given any assurance to Adanis to provide coal in lieu of power, Modi took the position that the Government had given such an assurance. The GMDC chairman was transferred thereafter,says Kejriwal.
Later Adanis persuaded the Government to give it coal free of cost and annulled its own commitment to provide power, Kejriwal said,adding that Modi’s generous gestures to Adanis resulted in the people of Gujarat paying more for power.
Kejriwal said that while he got much of the evidence on Geo Global and Adani from Sanjeev Bhutt a couple of months ago, he was not being either Bhutt’s or Congress’ spokesperson.
What I wonder is why Bhutt or the Congress did not raise these issues against Modi? He asked.
