Cong turns gun on defence minister over gold scam

New Delhi : The Congress on Thursday accused the Modi government of benefiting the companies of absconding diamantaire Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi by lifting on November 28, 2014 all restrictions on the gold import slapped in August 2013.

Its chief spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala pointed out how the profits of their Gitanjali Group of companies dipped from Rs 265 crore in 2012-13 to a loss of Rs 22.65 crore in 2013-14 and revenue dipped from Rs 10,380 crore to Rs 7,343 crore during the same period because of the 80:20 gold import scheme of the UPA Government.

He told a Press conference that reversal of this scheme by the Modi government resulted in profits of Mehul Choksi’s companies dramatically increased by over 200% from a loss of Rs 22.65 crore in 2013-14 to a profit of Rs 18.86 crore.

Surjewala said this explains who benefited the fraudsters and whose scheme hit them. He insisted that the 80:20 scheme was brought in August 2013 to mandate export of 20% imported gold after value addition and not on the day of the Lok Sabha election results on May 15, 2014 as alleged by Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad two days ago.

He said what Prasad was harping on was just the extension of the scheme to resolve the difficulties faced by the premier/star trading houses as stated in a circular of the department of economic affairs under the Finance Ministry.

Prasad had accused then Finance Minister P Chidambaram of tweaking the gold import scheme after losing the election by circulating the circular of the department’s undersecretary Jyotsna Gupta that said “the above proposal has the approval of Hon’ble Finance Minister.”

Surjewala said the law minister should better ask the Prime Minister to register FIR against Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman who had justified 80:20 scheme, including imports permitted to star/premier trading houses, on the Rajya Sabha in August 2014 as then minister of state for commerce in reply to a question as steps taken to institutionalise the bullion trade.