Congress dares PM to disclose BJP's bank transactions
New Delhi, Nov 14 (IANS) The Congress on Monday dared Prime Minister Narendra Modi to make public the bank transactions of the BJP's national and regional accounts from March to September 2016, following allegations of a spike in deposits in some bank accounts in September.
The Congress also attacked the government for allegedly leaking the demonetise move to a "selected few" and questioned how the BJP's Kolkata unit had deposited Rs one crore on November 8, the day Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the demonetisation of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes.
"In September 2016, as against August 2016, there was a spike in deposits of Rs 5,88,600 lakh crore in banks across the country," Congress spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala told reporters here.
"According to RBI figures, money deposited in all the banks in July 2016 was Rs 96,196 billion, whereas in September 2016, this rose to Rs 1,02,082 billion," he added.
Surjewala said the huge increase in deposited amount "tells the tale of black money".
"In July 2015, the money deposited in all the banks was Rs 88,301 billion. In September 2015, the money deposited in the banks was Rs 89,462 billion, which means around Rs 1 lakh crore extra money was deposited," said Surjewala.
"But, in July 2016, Rs 96,196 billion was deposited and in September 2016, it became 1,02,082 billion, which shows that the increase in the deposits during this period was around Rs 14 lakh crore," he added.
He also termed as a "lame duck excuse", Finance Minister Arun Jaitley clarifying that in September the arrears of the Seventh Pay Commission was paid leading to increase in bank deposits.
Congress said the Bharatiya Janata Party should disclose all the bank details of their national and state bank accounts from March to September 2016.
"Everything will become clear how much money has been exchanged before the demonetisation announcement."
"A few hours before the announcement of demonetisation, the Kolkata unit of BJP deposited Rs one crore in a bank bearing account number 554510034 on November 8, which was deposited by O.P. Jha. The information was leaked to a few selected people," he added.
The Congress also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of having pushed the country into a "financial chaos" through demonetisation and called him an autocrat.
"The powerful autocratic Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi has pushed the country into a financial chaos by overnight reducing their hard earned money to worthless pieces of paper," Surjewala said.
"Modiji has assumed that a clear majority in Parliament has given him a pass to act on his whims and fancies. But in a democracy the decisions have to be taken as per peoples' wishes," he added.
He said the black money that the government was targetting was not with the people who are wasting hours standing in long queues at banks and ATMs, but with "a handful of suited-booted friends of yours" who are not standing in queues.
"What is the reason that none of your corporate friends, your officers, your cabinet ministers your chief ministers or BJP leaders is seen standing in the queues outside banks? Is it not indicative of where the black money is actually lying?" Surjewala said.
Surjewala said that before demonetisation, the Modi government had already hiked the remittances limit by 130 per cent in a financial year.
Under the Liberalized Remittance Scheme (LRS), any citizen of India is allowed to freely remit up to $2,50,000 in a financial year. In 2013 this limit was $75,000.
