Targeted because we are from a particular political party: Karti Chidambaram
Karti, who is also being probed in the INX Media case along with his father, raised questions on the nature of the probe and said, “This is just a show. It is a false case and theatrics. My father and I are being targeted because we are the part of a particular party,” he said.
New Delhi The case against former finance minister P Chidambaram is false, his son and Lok Sabha MP Karti Chidambaram said on Thursday as the Congress rallied behind its senior leader and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) attacked him over the allegations of corruption.
Karti, who is also being probed in the INX Media case along with his father, raised questions on the nature of the probe and said that without a charge sheet, there would be a never-ending investigation “This is just a show. It is a false case and theatrics. My father and I are being targeted because we are the part of a particular party,” he said.
When asked about his father’s reaction on his arrest late Wednesday, Karti said, “He is calm and composed and he knows all the legal rigors. He has already seen such kind of proceedings and knows how things work.”
He said he didn’t know former INX Media director Indrani Mukherjea and rejected all charged leveled against him. “I was confronted with Indrani Mukherjea’s statement where she had made allegations of paying a bribe. However, I told them that I don’t know her and have never met her,” he said.
In Delhi, Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said India had witnessed the “broad daylight murder” of democracy and rule of law over the past two days. “The vindictive, selective and malicious manner in which former finance and home minister Chidambaram has been persecuted and prosecuted is nothing short of a brazen personal and political vendetta.”
West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee said the arrest of Chidambaram was “depressing” and alleged that the judiciary was not coming to the help of a “crying” democratic system. In her first reaction after Chidambaram’s arrest, Banerjee quoted Rabindranath Tagore and said the “message of justice is crying silently in isolation”.
CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury said that the law should take its own course, but the treatment meted out to the senior leader was “objectionable”. Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam chief MK Stalin termed it “political vendetta”, while the Rashtriya Janata Dal also attacked the BJP.
The BJP rejected all charges and said the Congress’s support for corruption was on display. Law is now catching up with the Congress, Union minister Prakash Javadekar said. “It’s a case of massive corruption. It’s a scam…looting the country was their (Congress) only mission and therefore law is now catching up. We don’t interfere in the works of the CBI or any probe agency. Law will take its own course, but now the Congress is united for protecting the corrupt. It is in support of corruption and this is on display,” Javadekar added.
(With Agency inputs)
