Income sources of Sonia, other leaders should be probed: Amar

New Delhi, June 9 (UNI) Alleging UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi's hand behind the PIL on which the Supreme Court has asked Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav to file his income tax details, Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh today demanded that the sources of her income and those of other alliance leaders also be investigated.

If needed, the Samajwadi Party will petition the court to bring leaders of other parties under such a scrutiny, Mr Singh told a news conference here.

''People have a right to know about Ms Gandhi's sources of income, of her children and of other leaders,'' he said.

Showing copies the Congress president's statements of income given to the Election Commssion, he said she has told the EC she owns no car and has savings of just Rs 20,000 in her name and just a few hundred dollars in a foreign bank.

How can the life-style the family is leading be supported by such meagre sources of income, he sought to know.

''The Congress has stooped so low in pursuing a politics of vendetta that it has lost the ability to think of the consequences of its actions,'' he added.

In fact by raising the issue of Mr Yadav's sources of income, the Congress has let loose a genie that will not go back into the bottle until it has exposed its leaders. Like the office of profit and the phone tapping issues, this one too will backfire on the ruling party, said Mr Singh, who is also facing an EC notice on the office of profit issue.

He felt that like the SP, former External Affairs Minister Natwar Singh too was being targeted by the Congress on the Volcker issue.

Their actions have forced him into rebellion, he said.

Replying to a question, he said ''Mulayam Singhji has been filing Income Tax returns for the last ten years and he has nothing to hide. In the next hearing of the court we would furnish all the income tax statements he has made to the Election Commission.'' The Supreme Court had on June 7 directed Mr Yadav and his family members, including his son Akhilesh Singh, MP, to file details of their income tax returns from 2001 to 2006 for the court to examine.

The Samajwadi Party chief in his counter affidavit has, however, dismissed the allegations as politically-motivated and has questioned the locus standi of the petitioner, Vishwanath Chaturvedi who is a Congress worker, on the grounds that he was not an aggrieved party.

A day earlier at Lucknow on June 6 Mr Yadav had expressed apprehensions of conspiracy by the Congress government at the centre for raids at the residence of senior party leader Amar Singh and his associates.

''We have specific information about raids on Mr Singh's permises and his associates in 4-5 days by the central agencies at the behest of the Congress regime,'' Mr Yadav alleged at a news conference.

UNI NAZ LR VV1806