BJP links Hooda's son with Reliance deal

Chandigarh, June 16 (UNI) Linking Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda's MP son Deepender Singh with the state government's controversial SEZ deal with the Reliance, the BJP today asked him to come out clean on the issue.

Without naming Rohtak MP Deepender Singh Hooda, BJP leader Krishnamurti Hooda who recently left Congress to join the safforn party said the CM should clarify whether a member of his family had worked for the Reliance group in the past and whether that particular person was ''sponsored'' by them during his stay in the US about three years ago.

Keeping in view well-known facts that Deepender had initially worked for a Reliance company and he also worked in the US for some time in the past, the BJP leader's reference to ''a member'' of the Hooda family was clearly targetted at the Hooda junior.

While the Chief Minister was not available for comments on the matter, one of his close aides said Krishnamurti Hooda had been an inconsequential leader even while he was in the Congress for so many years. ''Now when he has joined the BJP, he is just struggling to make his presence felt by making such wild and baseless charges.'' The allegations were made by Mr Krishnamurti Hooda at a press conference convened by former Union Minister I D Swami who called for immediate cancellation of the SEZ deal with Reliance under which very ''precious land'' in Gurgaon was handed over to the company as a ''very cheap'' rate.

Mr Swami said if the government did not cancel the deal and went ahead for a formal and final agreement with the Reliance in this regard on June 19 as scheduled, the party would launch a statewide stir on the issue.

The actual agreement of the Haryana government with the Reliance on the SEZ deal was to be signed on June 12 earlier but it was postponed to June 19 just a few hours before the signing ceremony.

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