Congress misused CBI to save Mulayam Singh: BJP

BJP General Secretary Arun Jaitley says there was a clear deal between the Congress and the Samajwadi Party under which the former would have asked the CBI to give a report in favour of Mulayam Singh Yadav.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Tuesday accused the Congress party of "grossly misusing" the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to save Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav in a case of assets-in-excess of income in return for his party's continued support to the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government.

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BJP general secretary Arun Jaitley told reporters, "There was a clear deal between the Congress and the Samajwadi Party under which the former would ask the CBI to give a report (in the Supreme Court) in favour of Mulayam Singh Yadav."

Mulayam Singh is embroiled in a November 2005 public interest litigation in the Supreme Court charging him and his family members with amassing wealth disproportionate to their known sources of income. The apex court had then ordered a CBI inquiry.

Jaitley added: "The CBI was grossly misused and abused for political ends like never in the past. It is now being used as a catalyst to ensure the government survives (with the support of the Samajwadi Party)."

The Samajwadi Party joined the Congress-led UPA during the July 22 trust vote last year in parliament over the India-US nuclear deal when the Left parties withdrew support to the government, pushing it into a minority.

Jaitley referred to Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh's attack on Monday on Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and said: "This was a false aggression to dispel the impression that they (the two parties) had a deal."

He went on: "Amar Singh's yesterday's aggression was entirely false and make-believe."