For the third consecutive day, former Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal younger’s son Arun Dhumal on Thursday took on Himachal Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh questioning the Rs 3.9 crore loans taken by the Chief Minister and his MP wife Pratibha Singh from a Delhi based individual.
Dhumal made the revelation based on the affidavit filed by Pratibha Singh during Mandi bye-election in which she has disclosed that she had a secured loan of Rs 1.5 crore and her spouse had taken a loan of Rs 2.40 crore from one Vakamulla Chander Shekher, a New Delhi-based private individual.
The younger son for former chief minister who held third consecutive press conference at Shimla produced the documents, including the affidavit filed by Pratibha Singh during Mandi bye-election.
He said that after becoming chief minister of the State, Virbhadra Singh took a loan of Rs 2.40 crore and Pratibha Singh took loan of Rs 1.50 crore from the same private individual at the time, when he had around Rs 10 crore in his bank account. Alleging that the private individual, who gave the loan to both husband and wife was favoured after Virbhadra Singh became CM, Arun Dhumal said that it was misuse of public office.
“Both chief minister Virbhadra Singh and his wife member of parliament Pratibha Singh should resign from their posts taking onus of the wrongdoings or should come out clean,” said Dhumal junior.
“People who themselves were a mask of innocence should now open the mask and come out in public with their real face and stop mudslinging on other people,” said Dhumal referring to the chief minister and his wife and said that people of the state want to know their true face.
Based on the affidavits, Dhumal junior also questioned the tenure of chief minister Virbhadra Singh when he was Union Steel Minister and in 2004 and 2007 Assembly elections, he did not have a single gram of jewellery but during 2009 parliamentary elections he had only 100 grams of jewellery worth Rs 1.50 lakh which went up to Rs 50 lakh during his stint as union minister till 2012.
“MP Pratibha Singh had 2.16 kg of jewellery in 2004 worth Rs 12.70 lakh and the amount of jewellery remained the same till 2013 Mandi bye-election but its value rose sharply to Rs 47 lakhs,” said Dhumal questioning the sharp rise which he claimed was not proportional to rise in gold prices prevailing in the country.
Dhumal also produced the document in reply to the Congress Government ministers’ Sujan Singh Pathania and Thakur Singh Bharmouri who claimed that the land for which he and his elder brother Anurag Thakur was booked cannot be sold before 20 years.
“I have the document of mutation done by Premu when he was allotted the land for being landless where it is clearly stated that the land cannot be sold till 15 years but after that the individual is free to sell the land or transfer the land to anyone,” added Dhumal.