Congress leaders must stop ranting and face the tax authorities to prove their innocence
Now that the Delhi High Court has refused to entertain Young Indian's plea in the National Herald case to quash the Income Tax Department's probe against it, senior Congress leaders must now prove their innocence. This they must do through the due legal process and not by obfuscating the issue through allegations of political vendetta. It is at least clear from the court's order that the Income Tax proceedings were not mala fide and that the Congress leaders have to approach the department to get their grievances addressed (the main of which is that the tax agency had no credible material to investigate). The court also refused to heed the Congress leaders' request that the High Court Bench send a notice to the tax department.
Once the petitioners realised that the court would not be brow-beaten, they hastily withdrew their plea. If the Congress leadership believes it has done nothing wrong in the National Herald issue and that the maze of its dealings is above board, surely it should be able to prove its case. It has a battery of eminent lawyers within the party too, who can competently handle the matter. But the Congress is barking up the wrong tree by blaming the media for distorting ‘facts' and also the Government for peddling ‘untruth'. All through the investigation into the case, Congress leaders connected with National Herald through different entities such as Young Indian and Associated Journals limited (AJl) have been less than cooperative with the Income Tax Department — something which the tax authorities have placed on record. When the tax agency served notices to these leaders — including party president Sonia Gandhi and vice president Rahul Gandhi — instead of adequately responding, they sought relief from the court. This is amazing. Why should these leaders duck a probe when they claim to be in the clearIJ It may be recalled that after a lower court, on a petition filed by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy, had summoned the Congress top brass in a case related to the National Herald issue, the Income Tax authorities had swung into action and issues notices to the share-holders of Young Indian, prominent among them being the Congress president and the vice president.
Swamy, who has been doggedly pursuing the case for some time now, has levelled grave allegations of funds misappropriation against the senior Congress leadership, saying it used Young Indian and AJl as vehicles for the fraud. He has claimed that the leaders appropriated National Herald property worth Rs5,000 crore spread in parts of the country through their web of dealings. It would be inappropriate to arrive at conclusions when the matter is being still considered by the Income tax Department. We must also keep in mind the fact that it will invariably reach the courts for final adjudication. Nevertheless, there is enough material in the public domain for one to be suspicious. A significant part of the alleged fraud happened during the period when the Congress was in power at the Centre. The Income Tax Department issued its notice for the assessment year of 2011-12, when a Congress-led Government was at the Centre.