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Gadkari received favours from Essar, says report

Last Updated 27 February 2015, 21:03 IST

Union Minister Nitin Gadkari found himself in the middle of a controversy on Friday after a news report said he accepted favours from a private company.

Compounding his problems, a public interest litigation (PIL) was also filed in the Supreme Court seeking a court-monitored Special Investigation Team (SIT) or CBI probe into the high-level political-bureaucratic-corporate nexus to change public policy and leak confidential papers.

The Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL) said internal emails of Essar group of companies showed that favours were made to BJP leader Nitin Gadkari, now an Union minister, former ministers Sriprakash Jaiswal, Beni Prasad Verma and Congress leader Digvijay Singh and journalists through high-end gifts, luxury travel or jobs to their recommended candidates.

“Essar, in turn, apparently gets favoured from such influential persons who can take executive decisions, change public policies, raise questions in Parliament, leak confidential government documents and plant stories in the media,” the petition filed by advocate Prashant Bhushan said. 

Reacting to news reports, Gadkari said he had visited a yacht belonging to the Essar company “just to see” it and asserted that he never took money from any corporate entity.
“I want to see new things and when Essar people invited me to see their yacht in the sea, I accepted their invitation. I would have gone to see it even if they had placed a ticket of Rs 500 for admission,” he told reporters.

CPIL cited a series of emails to argue that Gadkari and his family enjoyed hospitality at Essar vice-chairman Ravi Ruia’s 280-feet super-luxury personal yacht “Sunrays” in 2013 in his Europe tour.

“All arrangements are made by Essar for the visit of Gadkari and his eight family members, including pick-up by a helicopter from the Nice airport to the cruise and all meals during their stay.

On July 7, 2013, the Gadkari family is flown to the yacht in a helicopter from Nice airport and after the cruise, they are flown back to the airport on July 9, 2013,” the petition said, quoting the emails.

The petition also drew attention to the leak of classified files from petroleum ministry in which several people, including ministry officials, were arrested.

It cited an inter-office Essar note in June 2009, proposing to gift 200 high-end cell phones to MPs. A July 2013 email was also quoted in the petition showing how political leaders had approached Essar to hire their candidates for jobs in the company.

“Out of 60 people who want their candidates to work with Essar, there are candidates referred by Beni Prasad Verma (then steel minister), Sriprakash Jaiswal (then coal minister), Sanjeev Kumar (private secretary to then minister for petroleum and natural gas), Mohan Prakash (Congress general secretary in-charge of three states), Digvijay Singh (senior Congress leader), Varun Gandhi (BJP leader) and Yaswant Laguri (Lok Sabha member from Keonjhar, Odisha),” the petition alleged.

It also urged the court to cancel the privileges like subsidised land, newsprint, houses etc of media organisations and journalists indulging in paid news or publishing news reports to favour corporates. The petitioner also sought issuance of guidelines on corporate gifts.

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(Published 27 February 2015, 21:03 IST)

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