"Appropriate Decision" In Mahua Moitra's Cash-For-Query Case After Investigation: TMC

The Trinamool Congress has broken silence over the cash-for-query row involving its MP Mahua Moitra, saying that the lawmaker has clarified her stand on the allegations of bribe for questions raised and party would now await the probe by the parliamentary ethics committee as the matter has to do with "her rights and privileges".

Moitra faces allegations of accepting valuable gifts in exchange for permitting Darshan Hiranandani of H-Energy to submit parliamentary questions on her behalf. The party leadership would wait for the report by the Parliamentary panel before taking an "appropriate decision", Rajya Sabha MP Derek O'Brien told PTI.

BJP MP Nishikant Dubey and lawyer Jai Anant Dehadrai had alleged that Moitra accepted favours from Darshan Hiranandani. The TMC MP has filed a defamation suit against them before the Delhi High Court.

Dubey's complaint has been referred to Parliament's Ethics Committee by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla. "The member concerned has been advised by the party leadership to clarify her position regarding the allegations levelled against her. She has already done that," O'Brien said. "However, since the matter has to do with an elected MP, her rights and privileges, let the matter be investigated by the right forum of Parliament, after which the party leadership will take an appropriate decision," he added.

The TMC had earlier appeared to have taken a step back from the controversy surrounding the allegations against the Lok Sabha MP. Kunal Ghosh, the West Bengal general secretary and spokesperson for TMC, stated on Saturday that the party had chosen not to comment on the issue, suggesting that the individual at the center of this controversy was best positioned to respond.

Darshan Hiranandani, who allegedly paid Moitra to raise questions in Parliament about Adani Group, recently claimed in a signed affidavit that she targeted Gautam Adani to "malign and embarrass Prime Minister Narendra Modi whose impeccable reputation gave opposition no opportunity to attack him".

Vinod Sonkar, the chairman of the Lok Sabha Ethics Committee, had said he had received the sworn-in affidavit from Hiranandani. Moitra, however, has raised questions over the credibility of Hiranandani's affidavit, alleging that it was "drafted by the PMO" and he was forced to sign it after being "threatened" with "total shut down" of his family's businesses.