Khurana says ready for defamation suit by Sushma

New Delhi, July 13: Unnerved by senior BJP leader Sushma Swaraj's threat to file a defamation case against him, expelled party leader Madan Lal Khurana today said he was ready for it and maintained that she had alleged links with underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.

Talking to UNI, Mr Khurana said Ms Swaraj had given such threats to some newspapers earlier also but never implemented it as she was ''scared of being exposed.'' He said he has video evidence which would not only establish her links with the underworld don and his front man Romesh Sharma but also help in prosecuting her.

Meanwhile, in a letter sent to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on July 11, 2006, the former Delhi chief minister had urged a thorough probe by the CBI into the revelations made by Sharma in 1998 during interrogation that he had links with politicians, bureaucrats, Reliance Industries group president in Delhi V Balasubramaniam and Mrs Swaraj.

On the basis of revelations, police had raided the premises of Reliance Industries on the fifth floor of the Meridien Commercial Tower in Janpath and some incriminating documents were recovered on the basis of which a case against Reliance Executives was registered by the CBI and challan was put up in the court which is still pending, he said.

He said that the matter was so serious that even the premises of Reliance Chairman Dhirubhai Ambani in Mumbai were also raided.

Since Ambanis were close to the BJP leadership, the CBI Director was transferred subsequently, he alleged.

The former Rajasthan Governor said that CBI had suggested to file as many as 12 FIRs following the revelations by Sharma. But nothing went further as Sushma's name was also figuring among the accused.

He said the Delhi Police in its report to the Home Ministry had mentioned this fact.

Indirectly hitting out at the then Home Minister L K Advani for not pursuing the case to help Sushma, Mr Khurana has pointed out to the Prime Minister that the income tax Deputy Commissioner Vishwa Bandhu Gupta who had sent notice to Romesh Sharma, was also transferred. The Deputy Commissioner had alleged that he had been transferred at the instance of Ms Swaraj.

The issue, he said, also came up in Parliament at that time and Ms Swaraj an M P at that time, had swore that she did not know Romesh Sharma.

Mr Khurana said both the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Mr Advani at several public meetings had announced that the government would come out with a White Paper on the alleged links of Romesh Sharma with politicians. But it happeed, he said.

Mr Khurana referred to the report sent by the Delhi Police to the Home Ministry in which it had said that Romesh had revealed that he was known to Ms Swaraj for the past 15 years.

He said since Ms Swaraj's links with Sharma were established it was incumbent for the then Home Minister to order registeration of a formal case against her. "But, instead he hushed up this matter which itself is a criminal act on the part of Home Minister," he said in the four-page letter to the Prime Minister.

Mr Khurana, who had also enclosed a confidential note given by a government official in the matter, said that he was writing to him (PM) because Ms Swaraj was a Union minister at that time and had access to many secret official documents which had bearings on the national security. "Therefore, it is necessary that her links with Romesh Sharma, Dawood Ibrahim's point man, should be thoroughly probed by the CBI and a formal case be registered against her under the relevant provisions of the Criminal law," he said.

UNI