Date:12/09/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/09/12/stories/2008091255901200.htm

National

Deo panel to summon third BJP MP, driver

Neena Vyas

NEW DELHI: The Kishore Chandra Deo parliamentary committee, probing the “cash for vote” scam, has decided to summon three more witnesses.

The panel has been set up by Speaker Somnath Chatterjee to establish the facts related to the allegation that money was given to Lok Sabha members to violate their party whip in the vote on the trust motion sought by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on July 22.

There were suggestions from some members, at the committee meeting here on Thursday, that the third Bharatiya Janata Party MP, Mahavir Bhagora, who was allegedly given money to violate the party whip, be asked to appear before the panel. He has not deposed before it owing to ill health.

Others wanted the “man in yellow T-shirt,” who had allegedly carried bundles of cash into the residence of BJP MP Ashok Argal on July 22, be also identified and asked to make his statement before the committee.

The third person to be summoned is the driver of the car, which allegedly took the BJP MPs to the residence of Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh on July 22.

“We have asked the Lok Sabha secretariat to help to identify the man in the yellow T-shirt and summon him,” Mr. Deo told The Hindu.

The next meeting of the committee would be held on September 25.