West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee has come out in support of her party’s MP Mahua Moitra, who is facing allegations of taking money and gifts from a businessman to post Parliament questions on his behalf. Banerjee said that Moitra’s expulsion from Lok Sabha, which is being planned by the ruling BJP, will only help her in the next general election in 2024.
Banerjee accused the BJP of using central agencies to target opposition leaders and said that the same agencies will turn against the BJP after the 2024 election. She also claimed that the BJP government at the Centre will not last more than three months.
Banerjee made these remarks on Thursday at an event in Kolkata, where she addressed TMC workers at the Netaji Indoor Stadium. She said that after the arrest of her party’s leaders in various cases, Moitra’s expulsion from Lok Sabha is being orchestrated, but this will increase her popularity among the voters.
Moitra is under investigation by the Lok Sabha ethics committee for allegedly allowing Darshan Hiranandani, a businessman, to post questions directly to the dedicated online portal in exchange for money and gifts. The questions were related to the Adani Group, which Moitra allegedly targeted to “malign and embarrass” Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is often accused by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi of favouring the group led by billionaire Gautam Adani.
Hiranandani initially denied the charge but later admitted it in a signed affidavit. BJP MP Nishikant Dubey had first raised the issue and filed a complaint demanding Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla to launch a probe into it.
Moitra has denied the allegations against her, calling them “false, baseless and not supported by even a shred of evidence”. She has also questioned the credibility of Hiranandani and Dubey.
The ethics committee has adopted a 500-page report recommending Moitra’s expulsion from the 17th Lok Sabha in view of her “highly objectionable, unethical, heinous and criminal conduct”. The report was adopted with a 6:4 majority. The report has been submitted to Speaker Om Birla, according to news reports.
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