National

Cash-for-votes report given to panel members

NEW DELHI: The draft report on the cash-for-votes episode of July 22 has been circulated to members of the parliamentary committee set up to establish the facts by Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, but was not taken up for discussion at a meeting here on Monday.

Chairman of the committee Kishore Chandra Deo told The Hindu that according to rules governing such committees, copies of the draft report were sent to the Delhi addresses of members. However, since some of them were away and could not read the report, a discussion had been postponed to the next meeting scheduled for October 17.

Several committee members said they had not read the report and would do so before the next meeting, while some others charged that an attempt was made to sneak the report through and give a clean chit to Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh, accused by three BJP MPs of attempting to bribe them to violate their party whip and back the Manmohan Singh government in the crucial trust vote on July 22.

All the three MPs had voted against the motion in line with their party’s whip.

The report is expected to be given a final shape on October 17 after which it will be submitted to the Speaker. Given the political divide on this issue, the report is unlikely to be unanimous.

Mr. Chandra Deo said that while drafting the report he had kept strictly to the evidence presented before the committee. “Nothing in the draft report has been said on the basis of anyone’s views. I have referred to the evidence before all of us,” he said.

As for the committee not asking Mr. Amar Singh to depose before it, Mr. Deo said a Lok Sabha committee was not empowered to ask a member of the Rajya Sabha to depose before it.

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