 "Amit Shah")
Citing documents related to purchase of eight pieces of land in Bihar worth Rs 3.41 crore, in which the BJP and its chief Amit Shah have been shown as claimants, the Congress said the payments were made in cash and through cheques.
"This shows the BJP is linked with black money. This was a good way to convert black money into white before demonetisation," Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said.
He asked the BJP to come out with details of all land purchases made by the party in the past one year alleging the ruling party's national headquarters at 11 Ashoka Road had become the nerve centre of legalising black money.
According to the Congress, on September 6, Amit Shah bought land worth Rs 60.13 lakh in Lakhi Sarai through a person named Sanjiv Chaurasia; on September 14, BJP treasurer, Dalip Kumar Jaiswal, 11 Ashoka Road, New Delhi (the national BJP headquarters), purchased land worth Rs 85.15 lakh in Madhepura; on September 16 he purchased land worth Rs 41.74 lakh and another worth Rs 74.65 lakh in Katihar; on September 19, land worth Rs 25.7 lakh was purchased by BJP in Arval and on the same day land worth Rs 39 lakh was purchased by Amit Shah in Kishanganj; another land worth Rs 90 lakh was purchased by Shah in Arval on October 1 and in Madhubani land worth Rs 73.50 lakh was purchased by the saffron party.
There was no official reaction from the BJP over the Congress' allegations, but party sources said the decision to buy land to build party offices in each district of the country had been taken at the national executive in April 2015 and the purchases in question were part of the same plan.
The Congress further said that shortly before the note ban, the West Bengal unit of the BJP deposited cash worth Rs 3 crore in denominations of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes in a Kolkata bank indicating that elements within the saffron party had prior information of note ban.
Rahul Gandhi has termed the note ban a huge scam saying that PM Modi did it to benefit a handful of his rich friends.
Congress Lok Sabha lawmaker Sushmita Dev said the Prime Minister inconvenienced the common man in the name of secrecy over note ban but shared the secret with BJP chief Amit Shah.
"In the days to come, we will see more and more revelations of cash transactions indulged in by BJP functionaries. Let me assure you that we will continue to probe the black money dealings of the BJP that are now tumbling out of the closet," Congress Rajya Sabha member Rajeev Gowda.
