Raje was originally slated to be in London on Saturday to participate in a Resurgent Rajasthan event.
A day before the meeting in New Delhi, while Prime Minister Narendra Modi is reported to have held consultations with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, who returned on Thursday after a nine-day-long trip to the United States, in Jaipur Raje went ahead with her weekly “Jan Sunwai” (public hearing) meeting, wherein a large number of “Jan Pratinidhi” (public representatives) were present pledging allegiance to her.
Though her media managers played down reports on MLAs being summoned, or any signature campaign being launched, the presence of several ministers and party leaders including the state unit president made it amply clear that Raje was sending out a subtle message to central leadership that she was not isolated on her home turf.
On Friday, BJP spokespersons once again came out in her support that she was not tainted. “Did she go and depose <g data-gr-id="29">there</g> (in the UK)? No. There was no action that finally took place of her behalf,” said BJP spokesperson Nalin Kohli, adding that Ms Raje’s statement was made in 2011 “in her personal capacity, not in her capacity as Leader of Opposition in Rajasthan.” Finance Minister Arun Jaitley too, on return from the US trip, gave her a clean chit.
Raje reportedly told party leaders after Lalit Modi persuaded her to sign the statement, she had a change of heart as exemplified by the fact that she did not testify for him in a UK court. Without her deposition, the incriminating affidavit amounts to only “a proposed witness statement... intent, but not action.”
The protagonist of the raging controversy Lalit Modi, meanwhile, tweeted on Friday dragging Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s daughter Priyanka and her husband Robert Vadra into the controversy. In a series of tweets, the former IPL boss claimed that he was “happy to meet the Gandhi family at a restaurant in London.”
While the BJP seized on the opportunity to launch an attack with its spokesperson Sambit Patra asking “why Gandhi family is in constant touch with Lalit Modi”, which was countered by the Congress media department head Randeep Singh Soorjewala claiming, “If you see an individual in a restaurant full of people, it is neither a crime nor it is morally wrong.”
The Congress leader also said that instead of diverting attention of people from impropriety committed by senior BJP leaders Sushma Swaraj and Vasundhra Raje, it should ask for
their resignation.