Hiranandani turns approver, confirms that Mahua Moitra gave him parliamentary login credentials, took luxury gifts for asking questions targeting Adani
Darshan Hiranandani, the CEO of real estate-to-energy group Hiranandani, who has been at the centre of the ‘cash for questions’ scandal involving Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra has turned approver. He admitted that he used the Rajya Sabha MP’s Parliamentary login to ask questions from the BJP-led central government.
“She provided me with her email ID as a Member of Parliament, so I could send her information, and she could raise questions in Parliament. I went along with her proposal… Based on specific information provided to me, I continued to draft and submit questions using her Parliamentary login when necessary,” he said, in the affidavit.
He claimed Moitra “made frequent demands” including “expensive luxury items, providing support on renovation of her officially allotted bungalow in Delhi, travel expenses, holidays, etc, apart from providing secretarial and logistical help for her travels within India and to different parts of the world.”
What Darshan Hiranandani Said?
He said that he met Moitra at the Bengal Global Business Summit in 2017 when she was a MLA, and since then she became a “close personal friend” over the years whom he had expected to use for getting business in states ruled by opposition parties.
“She shared with me her email ID as Member of Parliament, so that I could send her information, and she could raise the questions in the Parliament. I went along with her proposal,” he said in the affidavit. She “provided me with her Parliament login and password so that I could post the questions directly on her behalf when required.”
Hiranandani claimed that Moitra knew about IOC choosing Dhamra over his company’s LNG terminal. “Based on this information, Moitra drafted a few questions that would have elements to embarrass the government by targeting the Adani group; questions that she could raise in Parliament,” he said.
“Moitra was very ambitious and wanted to make a name for herself at the national level,” he said of her winning the Lok Sabha election from Krishnanagar in West Bengal in 2019.
“She was advised by her friends and advisors that the shortest possible route to fame is by personally attacking Modi.” However, the prime minister enjoyed “an impeccable reputation and was not giving any opportunity to anyone to attack him in policy, governance or personal conduct,” he said.
“As was her wont, she thought that the only way to attack Modi is by attacking Gautam Adani and his group as both were contemporaries and they belong to the same state of Gujarat.” She was helped by the fact that Adani had caused jealousy and had detractors among some sections of business, politics, and media.
“So, she expected support from these sections in her endeavour to malign and embarrass the Prime Minister by targeting Adani,” he said.
Darshan also claimed the TMC leader sought various favours from him. “Many a times I felt that she was taking undue advantage of me and pressurising me to do things I didn’t want to, but I had no choice, because of the aforementioned reasons,” he stated
