Scams led to inflation, says BJP leader Kirit Somaiya

Indore, Jan 15 (PTI) Accusing the Congress-led UPAgovernment of defending those involved in 2G, CWG and riceimport scams, the BJP national secretary Kirit Somaiya todaysaid that this resulted in high inflation.

"Rupees four lakh-crore worth scams are linked to 2Gspectrum, Commonwealth Games and rice export. After thesescams, inflation in the country has shot up," Somaiya toldreporters here.

He said that the centre had decided to export rice tofive African nations in 2008-09, and the export was to becarried out by government agencies. But the contract was latergiven to private firms, leading to the loss of over 2000 croreto the exchequer, he alleged.

The BJP leader claimed that when the government carriedout inquiry into the export, irregularities came to the light,and a rice-export firm was blacklisted.

Despite this, the Union Minister of State for Commerceand Industries Jyotiraditya Scindia felicitated the same firmfor its outstanding performance in exports at a function ofFederation of Indian Exporters Organisation some days back,Somaiya alleged.

"This shows that the government was trying to defend thepeople involved in scam," he said.