Gill drags Jaitley in HI affairs, hockey body rebuts charge

Arun Jaitley on Wednesday faced an attack from a new quarter when banned IHF president KPS Gill urged the the Delhi government to probe the Union Finance Minister’s “conflict of interest” in the national hockey body, an allegation which was outrightly rejected by Hockey India.

Former top cop, Gill, who is the chief of banned Indian Hockey Federation, has written to Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, alleging that Jaitley had appointed his daughter Sonali as the counsel for Hockey India (HI) when he was a member of the advisory board of Hockey India League.

HI president Narinder Batra strongly refuted the allegations, saying Gill’s charges were “baseless” .

Batra said it was just a “creation” by the banned IHF chief to settle scores with him.

Batra admitted that Jaitley’s daughter Sonali fought one of the the many cases for HI for a very brief period but just as a professional and it was unfair to attach any motives.

“The time that KPS Gill is talking about, we had a number of cases to fight. To be precise we had 22 cases to fight in that period in different places of the country, so we had to hire a lot of lawyers and lot of law firms. Jaitley and Bakshi firm was one of them. The money that went to them was hardly 2 per cent. So I don’t know where the conflict of interest comes from,” Batra told reporters.

“I just can’t give my cases to anybody. I have to hire some body who is a professional and whom I know. All my dealings and balance sheet is on the HI website,” he added.

“It’s all Gill saab’s creation. I don't know what Gill has against me. I am not worried, we come under the RTI,” he asserted.