In a statement, Piyush Goyal asserted that he is being “targeted for vested political interest possibly to deflect attraction from the repeated scams of Congress and its leaders”.(Express file Photo by Praveen Jain)
The Congress on Wednesday demanded removal of Railways Minister Piyush Goyal, and a statement in Parliament by both the minister and the Prime Minister, in the wake of a report published on the website ‘The Wire’ that a company of which Goyal was chairman and whole-time director for two years until 2010 had defaulted payment of loans to the tune of Rs 650 crore to a consortium of banks.
The company, Shirdi Industries, got 65 per cent of its outstanding loan waived off in 2017, the report said, a point reiterated by the main opposition party.
While the Congress also demanded an independent investigation by a sitting Supreme Court judge into the matter, Goyal rejected the charges and said that he has had “no relationship with Shirdi Industries since the last eight years”, and he is “not responsible for their issues”. Goyal also pointed out that “none of the ministries” he has handled has “dealt with this company”.
Addressing the media, Congress leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad, Veerappa Moily and Pawan Khera questioned the silence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on the issue. “Serious and scandalous facts warrant a thorough independent judicial investigation by a sitting Supreme Court judge. It has made the position of Piyush Goyal untenable…. Piyush Goyal must be sacked forthwith,” Azad said.
Hours later, Congress MPs, citing the report in The Wire, wrote to Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu and stated that either Modi or Goyal should “make a statement on the floor of the House (and) inform the House about the facts since Parliament is in session”.
In a statement, Goyal asserted that he is being “targeted for vested political interest possibly to deflect attraction from the repeated scams of Congress and its leaders”.
The Congress said Goyal was chairman and director of Shirdi Industries from April 25, 2008 to July 1, 2010. During this period, the party claimed, Shirdi Industries “worked out a loan of Rs 258.62 crore from a consortium of banks, headed by Union Bank of India.”
Responding to this, a statement issued by Goyal pointed out that he was “neither a Member of Parliament nor the Director of State Bank of India (SBI) at the time of enhancement” and, consequently, “there is no question” of him “influencing this loan enhancement”.
The Congress said, “On June 8, 2015, Shirdi Industries was declared sick. Despite the fact that Shirdi Industries (of Rakesh Agarwal & Mukesh Bansal) had been declared sick for being unable to repay loans, their sister company, Asis Industries, proceeded to grant an unsecured loan of Rs 1.59 crore in 2015-16 to Intercon Advisors, a company owned by Goyal’s wife Seema.” Goyal, the opposition party maintained, was “also director of this company from 2005 to 2013”.
The statement issued by Goyal said that Shirdi Industries has got “nothing to do with Goyal as he has no role in the company after 1st July, 2010, and any distress the company had relates to 2013, when Congress was in power”. The Congress questioned how the creditor banks agreed to waive off 65 per cent loan when Shirdi Industries approached the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT).
The party stated: “Outstanding loan amount of consortium of banks was Rs 651.87 crore. Shockingly, the consortium of banks agreed to take a haircut (waive off) 65 per cent of loan amount and settled for Rs 228.85 crore….. Surprisingly, no one raised an objection that the promoter of Shirdi Industries, Rakesh Agarwal (a close associate and friend of Union Minister Goyal), could not have bid in view of prohibition contained in Section 29A of Insolvency Code, which came into forces in November 2017.”
According to the opposition party, “The web of corporate entities that ties Goyal and his family to Agarwal/Bansal is glaringly apparent. Is it not a clear-cut case of conflict of interest and impropriety on the part of the Union Minister? How was a promoter permitted to bid for the company despite the prohibition under Insolvency Code?”
Responding to this, Goyal deplored the Congress for dragging the judiciary for “petty politics”. “It is sad that Congress is casting aspersions on NCLT, which is an independent judicial body and is reported to have accepted the resolution plan as approved by Committee of Creditors much before NCLT ordinance of Nov 2017,” Goyal’s statement read. “Nobody can influence the judiciary. It is unfair that Congress has tried to drag judiciary for its petty politics.”
Goyal called the Congress’s charges “malicious” and stated that the party “factually misleads and makes incorrect conclusions with false and defamatory statements and it is full of factual inaccuracies, mix up of dates and alluding to events with no relevance” to the minister.