Fri. Mar 29th, 2024
By World Economic Forum from Cologny, Switzerland (Arun Jaitley) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

The PNB scam has become a political blame-game that underestimates the magnitude of the scam. Rahul Gandhi stirred the pot of controversy adding one his many accusations against BJP. But this time he made it personal. Gandhi alleged that Jaitley was remaining silent on the scam because he was trying to protect his daughter.

Jaitley’s daughter in question had shared a short time with Geetanjali Gems through her law firm. His question to the finance minister was that if other law firms are being brought under the scanner by the CBI why not his daughter’s? The retainership was received by Jaitley and Bhakshi in December 2017, but the ties were cancelled when the news of the scam came out in January 2018.

While Rahul Gandhi might be asking a reasonable question, Arun Jaitley revealed that Nirav Modi had obtained 1,213 fraudulent LoUs from PNB in six years starting from March 2011, in the Rajya Sabha. In the 6 years, 53 were genuine LoUs. The LoUs had a validity for one year. This perhaps opens up a new inroad into the case.

The scam has attained high proportions and so far at least 19 people have been arrested by the CBI. The case has also thrown up huge loopholes in India’s banking system and larger questions of credibility which can’t be solved by top politicians throwing dirt on each other. How is the government going to make sure this doesn’t happen again and how will it recover all the money lost? Those are the real questions for which the answers are still sadly unknown.

By Sahitya