New Delhi:
Expelled Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh Wednesday hit out at Lokpal bill drafting committee co-chairman Shanti Bhushan and his son Prashant Bhushan for declaring that they had no contacts with him.
Addressing a press conference here Wednesday, Amar Singh said: 'Shanti Bhushan (who is 85 years old) does not remember many things because of his age.'
Amar Singh said the Samajwadi Party had chartered an aircraft for Bhushan to plead a case for the party in Lucknow.
'We gave him initially Rs.30 lakh. But he asked for more and took Rs.50 lakh in total,' he said.
Amar Singh said he hoped 'Bhushan had mentioned the fees of Rs.50 lakh in his tax returns'.
Singh was commenting on Bhushan's recent remarks that he had not been in touch with Amar Singh.
The Bhushans and Amar Singh have been engaged in an allegations war for the past few days with a controversial CD being circulated.
The CD has alleged conversations among Shanti Bhushan, Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam Singh Yadav and Amar Singh. Bhushan is alleged to have promised Mulayam Singh Yadav 'to fix a judge for a price'.
The CD, part of a case against Amar Singh pending in the Supreme Court, was submitted to a Delhi Police station by Amar Singh.
The estranged SP leader said that Wednesday's news reports of the father-son duo being allotted farmhouse plots in Noida at below market prices should also be probed.
Taking a dig at the civil society movement against corruption led by Anna Hazare, Amar Singh said it could be a 'front' of BJP, citing Hazare's praise for Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
Pointing out that Hazare had appreciated the work of Modi and Bihar's National Democratic Alliance (NDA) Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Singh said: 'I hope that in the name of civil society, this movement is not a front for BJP.'
The BJP had criticised the Congress for launching a witch-hunt against the father-son lawyer duo.