Swamy demands interrogation of Sonia in Bofors case

New Delhi, Mar 18 (UNI) Janata Party President Subramanian Swamy today demanded interrogation of Congress President Sonia Gandhi in connection with the Bofors case, especially in the context of the Centre keeping "silence" over the detention of Italian businessman Ottavio Quattrocchi in Argentia and the failure of the CBI to act in time to prevent him getting bail in the Latin American country.

"I demand that Ms Gandhi be interrogated," he said at a news conference here, while pointing out that the Principal investigator in Sweden Sten Lindstrom had suggested that she should be questioned to know the Bofors truth.

"There should be a full-fledged investigation," Mr Swamy said.

Referring to the February 1 legal notice sent to the USA-based author of website "hinduunity.org" seeking apology for publishing an alleged "despicable heinous" report on an ''incident involving Amethi MP Rahul Gandhi and his five foreigner friends'' in his constituency on December 3, 2006, he said the author Rohit Vyasman had rebuffed the apology demand and, instead, demanded an independent and complete investigation into the incident.

In this context, he asked why the Congress Party had not initiated a case against the website since it had refused to apologise. "The question in law is that if you issue a legal notice seeking apology, you can initiate prosecution proceedings if no apology is received within 15 days." In this case, he said, about six weeks had already passed.

"The failure of Mr Gandhi to do anything further after issuing a notice is tantamount in law of prima facie admission of guilt," he contended.

"Since Mr Gandhi is an MP, it becomes a public issue. Since his five foreigner friends are also alleged to have been involved, it becomes a matter of national security as well," Mr Swamy said.

Alleging misappropriation of fund by former President of Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (IGNCA) Kapila Vatsayan, he said he had already given a complaint to the CBI five months ago. "If the CBI does not file an FIR, I will be constrained to go to court.' He alleged that the IGNCA had been run as a "personal fiefdom" of Ms Gandhi since 1995 "when without reference and concurrence of the Cabinet she got a spurious approval on behalf of the government to amend the deed of the Centre and making her a life time trustee." Referring to the Sethusamudram project in Tamil Nadu, he said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh should institute a committee of experts to determine whether there were alternative routes that could be carved out in the Palk Strait while preserving the hoary Rama Setu as a World Heritage Site under the UNESCO guidelines.

"According to my information, there are four alternatives which are much cheaper compared to the present Rs 2,500 crore project," he claimed.

In this context, he said the best alternative route was to carve out a canal on the Pamban-Dhanushkodi 15 km land strip as was done (but on a much larger scale) in creating the Suez and Panama canals.

This would cost less than Rs 1,500 crore.

Mr Swamy said millions of HIndus the world over believed that the Rama Setu was constructed for the purpose of Lord Rama crossing across to Sri Lanka to kill Ravana.

He said if the government was not acting on a complaint filed before it by the Hindu Munnai, President A P J Abdul Kalam should refer it to the Supreme Court under Article 143 of the Constitution.

UNI