Meira Kumar and Pratibha Patil

I was wondering how Sonia Gandhi who infamously was responsible for making fraudulent Pratibha Patil as President could have become wise enough to nominate Meira Kumar for Presidency.

My astonishment was short-lived. My assumption that Meira Kumar is a clean politician has been proved wrong. She is reported to have fraudulently converted a government bungalow into a memorial for her father, Jagjivan Ram. She surreptitiously got her rental arrears to the extent of Rs.1.97 crore waived.

The NDA government for political reasons is turning a blind eye to all this. Now I am not surprised that Soniaji chose to nominate Meira Kumar. Sonia is consistent in supporting the embezzlers. I am sure that if Ram Nath Kovind has any fraudulent credentials, he will also gain Sonia's support.

Sonia Gandhi's golden opportunity

There is a school of thought that Sonia Gandhi denied herself the opportunity of becoming India's prime minister. In other words, she is supposed to have sacrificed what was within her reach. There are also people who say that she could not have become the prime minister and anyway MMS was only her proxy. That is, she gained authority without responsibility.

The Delhi High Court order in the National Herald case has given an opportunity to Sonia Gandhi to prove which view is correct. If she goes through the processes of law and gets investigated without demur, people will accept her bonafides. On the other hand, if she is bent on creating a ruckus, stalling the parliament and continuing her non-cooperation with the government, the contrary signal will be sent.

Till now, her reaction has been peevish. She says she has nothing to fear because "she is Indira Gandhi's daughter-in-law." She does not say that she has nothing to fear because she has committed no wrong.

National Herald case

Delhi High Court has refused to cancel the summons issued by the Trial Court to Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and others to appear before the Trial Court. The petition in the trial court filed by Subramanian Swamy alleges that the Gandhis have unlawfully enriched themselves by acquiring Associated Journals Ltd. by dubious means. Evidence seems to support Swamy's contention. Therefore Justice Sunil Gaur of the Delhi High Court rejected the petition of Gandhis.

Text of the order is available here:

http://lobis.nic.in/ddir/dhc/SUG/judgement/07-12-2015/SUG07122015CRLMM33322014.pdf

It is a pity that the Gandhis have such a stranglehold over Congress that the party members respect them more than the party. Some extracts from the order:

"It has to be kept in mind that AJL was a Public Limited Company, which had immovable assets having

value of crores of rupees. It is matter of record that Congress Party had

assigned the huge debt of `90 crores to a Section 25 Company i.e. Young Indian on receiving a paltry amount of `50 lacs only. For this, the Congress Party owes an explanation to its supporters, donors, etc.."

"Considering the fact that AJL has sizeable assets of `2000 crores, it

needs to be explained by petitioners as to what was the need to assign the

huge debt of `90 crores when this debt could have been easily liquidated

by AJL from its sizeable assets. Even writing off such a huge debt by the

Congress Party can legitimately attract allegations of cheating, fraud, etc..

Petitioners had gone step further in conspiring to get this huge debt

assigned to a Special Purpose Vehicle i.e. Y.I. and thereafter, to hijack

AJL via Y.I.. Such grave allegations levelled against petitioners cannot

be brushed aside lightly by relying upon judicial precedents cited, to

conclude that the ingredients of the criminal offences alleged are lacking.

To say the least, to do so would be preposterous. Such a prima facie view

is being taken in view of the fact that the assignment of the huge debt by

Congress Party to Y.I. was for a paltry sum of `50 lacs. This is certainly

questionable and justifiably attracts the allegations of cheating,

misappropriation, criminal breach of trust, etc.. Such a view is being

taken as it needs to be explained before the trial court as to how the net

worth of AJL can be negative when it has assets worth crores of rupees. It

also crops up in the mind of a prudent person as to why interest free loan

was assigned and why it was not written off. In any case, writing off

such a huge debt by a legendry Political Party is indeed questionable.

Instead of adopting such a questionable course, what was done by the

Congress Party is more questionable. It also needs to be answered as to

why the genuine shareholders were marginalized in the Extraordinary

General Meeting, which was attended by just seven shareholders. Such a

questionable conduct of petitioners certainly invites allegations of

committing the offences for which petitioners have been summoned. Is it

not criminal misappropriation of Congress Party’s funds? This aspect

needs to be addressed after respondent-complainant is cross-examined at

the pre-charge stage. It also needs to be examined at pre-charge stage as

to whether lacs of citizens who had donated to the Congress Party felt

cheated by assignment of such a huge debt to Y.I. who was managed by

none others than petitioners, who were Office Bearers of Congress Party

as well as Directors of Y.I.. Not only this, the main persons, who were

instrumental in allegedly siphoning off political funds were the recipients

of the assignment of the huge debt by the Congress Party and they were

the same persons, who had clandestinely acquired the control of AJL. All

this smacks of criminality. What species of criminal offence is made out

is not required to be seen at this initial stage."

 "Upon reading the complaint as a whole,

it emerges that the transactions of the Congress Party with AJL via Y.I.

are not a mere commercial transactions as these transactions legitimately

attract the allegations of cheating, fraud, breach of trust,

misappropriation, etc. "

"This Court is of the considered view that the gravity of the

allegations levelled against petitioners has a fraudulent flavour involving

a national Political Party and so, serious imputations smacking of

criminality levelled against petitioners need to be properly looked into.

39. After having considered the entire case in its proper perspective,

this Court finds no hesitation to put it on record that the modus operandi

adopted by petitioners in taking control of AJL via Special Purpose

Vehicle i.e. Y.I., particularly, when the main persons in Congress Party,

AJL and Y.I. are the same, evidences a criminal intent. Whether it is

cheating, criminal misappropriation or criminal breach of trust is not

required to be spelt out at this nascent stage. In any case, by no stretch of

imagination, it can be said that no case for summoning petitioners as

accused in the complaint in question is made out. Questionable conduct

of petitioners needs to be properly examined at the charge stage to find

out the truth and so, these criminal proceedings cannot be thwarted at this

initial stage. Such a view is being formed on a bird’s eye view of the

whole case and the observations in the impugned order of there being a

prima facie case have to be read in the context of there being sufficient

grounds for summoning petitioners."

Modi's false prediction

The Prime Minister confidently claimed before the elections that the Congress party would not bag even 10 seats in either Maharashtra or Haryana. All exit polls indicate that the Congress will get more than 10 seats in both these states.

Why did Modi mislead the nation? The answer is simple. He had hoped that Rahul Gandhi would campaign actively. Smart strategist that he is, Rahulji desisted from active canvassing and thus brightened his party's chances.

Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi have reduced the Indian National Congress into Indian Notional Congress. 

"Venomous" and "obsessively suspicious" Sonia Gandhi

Natwar Singh has characterised Sonia Gandhi as venomous and obsessively suspicious. In normal circumstances, 'one life is not enough'. But anyone associated with Sonia Gandhi is bound to feel that one life is more than enough. If in doubt, ask Manmohan Singh.

It is not entirely her fault that Sonia Gandhi is what she is. Undue obsequiousness of Congress leaders demeaned the party. Natwar Singh was not an exception as long as he was in the GOP. Almost all Congress leaders feathered their respective nests while continuing to pay obeisance to Her Royal Highness as an insurance to procure impunity from accountability. 

Natwar Singh asserts that Rahul's vehement resistance was responsible for Sonia Gandhi's reluctance to become the prime minister in 2004. At that time, she had claimed that she was going by her 'inner voice'. Sonia could easily have said that her inner voice supported Rahul's opinion and that her conscience was the deciding factor. But this did not occur to her because of her lifelong duplicity.

Rahul Gandhi has not yet responded to Natwar Singh's assertion. We do not know if he is now in India at all. According to Natwar Singh, Priyanka mentioned Rahul Gandhi's minatory request to his mother to stay away from prime ministership in the presence of Sonia, Manmohan, Natwar Singh and Suman Dubey. Therefore, this information obviously cannot be wrong. In the year 2004, Sonia Gandhi took the country for a ride with her histrionic and mendacious 'sacrifice'. We were as gullible as anyone could be.

Sonia Gandhi has promised to write her autobiography. Which ghost writer would oblige her in the changed circumstances? In an uncharacteristic manner, Sonia Gandhi has got openly provoked by the submission of her erstwhile confidante. Hopefully, at least now the Congress leaders would show her her place. The party and the country have suffered enough.

Devyani Khobragade's grief and relief

It is ironic that it is  the American legal system that produced both grief and relief for Devyani Khobragade. Faced with a similar situation, any other country would have declared her persona non grata and the matter would have ended there.

Had an American judge not issued summons to Sonia G., Devyani might have been left to fend for herself. At any rate, Salman Khurshid would not have been hyper active playing tit for tat.

According to usually unreliable sources, Khurshid who had earlier called Sonia Gandhi 'our mother', went to her to receive a pat for a job well done. He also told her that if he was the Law Minister, he would have advised a District judge to issue summons to a leading politician in America.

Sonia summoned Kapil Sibal and chastised him for his unpardonable omission. Not one to be outsmarted by a cabinet colleague, he told her that there is no one in the U.S. who is as important to that country as Soniaji is to India and issuing summons to an American politician would be a mistaken recognition of his comparable greatness.  Gandhi was mightily pleased.