File photo: Sushma Swaraj with her husband Swaraj Kaushal.
New Delhi:
Months after Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj helped tainted cricket tycoon Lalit Modi get urgent travel documents in the UK, the entrepreneur asked her husband, Swaraj Kaushal, to serve as his back-up on the board of one of his companies, Indofil.
NDTV has accessed an email sent in April by Mr Modi in which he asks the minister's husband to be an Alternate Director, which would allow Mr Kaushal to fill in for him at board meetings. Mr Kaushal told NDTV that he rejected the proposal.
"I have been a lawyer for Lalit Modi for over 20 years... I did not given my consent to be the director. The request was withdrawn," he told NDTV.
But the opposition Congress says that the offer from Mr Modi offers new indicting evidence of the inappropriate proximity between him and the Foreign Minister and her family. "I think it's time for the Foreign minister to sing the national anthem and step down," said Tom Vadakkan of the Congress.
Request denied, said the BJP. "When he turned down the offer, what is the problem? Swaraj Kaushal has not hidden his professional links to Lalit Modi," said the party's GVL Narasimha Rao.
Mr Modi is wanted in an omnibus of corruption cases in India and now lives in London. Earlier this month, the government was hit by the revelation that last year, Mrs Swaraj intervened with UK officials to enable Mr Modi to travel to Portugal with his wife. But the opposition Congress says the minister is guilty of grave conflict of interest in using her office to help her husband's client, who has avoided returning to India to face the charges against him.
The Opposition is demanding the resignation of Ms Swaraj and Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, who in writing backed Mr Modi's immigration appeal in the UK. Mr Modi also bought stake in a company co-owned by her son.
NDTV has accessed an email sent in April by Mr Modi in which he asks the minister's husband to be an Alternate Director, which would allow Mr Kaushal to fill in for him at board meetings. Mr Kaushal told NDTV that he rejected the proposal.
"I have been a lawyer for Lalit Modi for over 20 years... I did not given my consent to be the director. The request was withdrawn," he told NDTV.
But the opposition Congress says that the offer from Mr Modi offers new indicting evidence of the inappropriate proximity between him and the Foreign Minister and her family. "I think it's time for the Foreign minister to sing the national anthem and step down," said Tom Vadakkan of the Congress.
Request denied, said the BJP. "When he turned down the offer, what is the problem? Swaraj Kaushal has not hidden his professional links to Lalit Modi," said the party's GVL Narasimha Rao.
Mr Modi is wanted in an omnibus of corruption cases in India and now lives in London. Earlier this month, the government was hit by the revelation that last year, Mrs Swaraj intervened with UK officials to enable Mr Modi to travel to Portugal with his wife. But the opposition Congress says the minister is guilty of grave conflict of interest in using her office to help her husband's client, who has avoided returning to India to face the charges against him.
The Opposition is demanding the resignation of Ms Swaraj and Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, who in writing backed Mr Modi's immigration appeal in the UK. Mr Modi also bought stake in a company co-owned by her son.
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