File photo of Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje
Tainted cricket honcho Lalit Modi did have extensive business dealings with the son of Chief Minister Vasundhra Raje, her party admitted today, while insisting that the transactions were legitimate and that all due taxes were paid.
NDTV reported exclusively on Thursday that Mr Modi, who moved from India to London in 2010 after being named in corruption cases, had done a sweetheart deal with Mrs Raje's son.
Between 2008 and 2009, Mr Modi paid Rs 96,000 per share in a company owned by Dushyant Singh, the Chief Minister's son. But in his income tax returns for 2013, Mr Singh declared that his shares in the same firm were worth just Rs 10 each.
The huge premium paid by Mr Modi for those shares was in addition to an unsecured loan of nearly Rs 11 crore to Mr Singh's Niyant Heritage Hotels Private Limited.
"As far as Dushyant Singh's case is concerned, all these facts were given in his I-T returns and election affidavits which are already in public domain," said BJP spokesperson Sudhanshu Trivedi.
The transactions are being investigated by the Enforcement Directorate, according to sources.
Mrs Raje has not commented on the controversy. Earlier this week in an interview, Mr Modi disclosed that in 2011, Ms Raje backed his application for UK immigration with a legal document that sought confidentiality for her support.
The document shared by Mr Modi does not have the Chief Minister's signature, but sources in the BJP say that the charge against Ms Raje is being taken gravely. So far, nobody in the party's central leadership has spoken in her defense.
Mr Modi moved to London five years ago after he was swamped with allegations of graft in how he operated the Indian Premier League which he founded in 2008. His passport was cancelled by India in 2011, and restored last year by the Delhi High Court.