An aide of Congress leader Satish Sharma allegedly showed a US Embassy employee "two chests containing cash" and said Rs 50 to 60 crore was ready for use as "pay-offs" to win the support of MPs ahead of the crucial vote of confidence over the Indo-US nuke deal, a set of US diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks have claimed.
Noting the Congress party machine was working "overtime" behind the scenes in the run-up to the trust vote on July 22,2008, the cables also claimed the party had allegedly paid Rs 10 crore to each of their "four RLD MPs".
RLD chief Ajit Singh denied the allegations of pay-offs and said the party voted against the Manmohan Singh government since it was against the civil nuclear deal.
The cable claimed that Nachiketa Kapur, Sharma's political aide, mentioned to an Embassy staff member on July 16, 2008 that Ajit Singh's RLD had been paid Rs 10 crore for each of their "four MPs" to support the government.
Kapur reportedly mentioned that money was not an issue at all, but the crucial thing was to ensure that those who took the money would vote for the government, according to the cable sent from the US Embassy to the US State department dated July 17, 2008.
Kapur showed the Embassy employee "two chests containing cash" and said that around Rs 50-60 crore was lying around the house for use as pay-offs, the cable claimed. The cable has been accessed by southern daily, 'The Hindu'.
Captain Satish Sharma told television channels that he had no such aide called Nachiketa Kapur.
Denying the allegations against him, Kapur claimed he did not meet any American Embassy official and that he had nothing to do with the confidence vote.
According to Wikileaks, the cable mentioned a meeting the US political counsellor had with Sharma, considered to be a close friend of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, on July 16 when the Rajya Sabha Congress MP told him that he as well as others in the party were "working hard" to ensure the UPA government wins the trust vote.
Another Congress party insider reportedly told the counsellor that Minister of Commerce and Industry Kamal Nath is also helping to "spread largesse," the cable said.
"Formerly he could only offer small planes as bribes, according to this interlocutor, now he can pay for votes with jets," the cable released by Wikileaks said.
Sharma reportedly told the political counsellor that "PM Singh and others had tried to work on the Akali Dal (8 votes) through NRI businessman Sant Chatwal and other, but unfortunately it did not work out."
According to the cable, Sharma mentioned that efforts to encourage the Shiv Sena (12 votes) to abstain were ongoing. While different Congress operatives were working on different groups of MPs, Sharma said that Rahul Gandhi was "personally working Omar (Abdullah)”.
Sharma also reportedly mentioned he was also exploring the possibility of trying to get "former prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's son-in-law Ranjan Bhattacharya" to speak to BJP representatives to try to divide the BJP ranks, according to the diplomatic cable.
According to the Wikileaks, the diplomatic cable mentioned that "our best guess" ahead of the confidence vote showed the government would maintain its slim majority with the anticipated vote count at around 273 in favour, 251 opposed and 19 abstentions.
The UPA government won the confidence motion getting 275 votes in favour, 256 against and 10 abstentions.
Just before the vote, the BJP had produced cash on the floor of the House and alleged that this was the money the government had used to try and buy the support of MPs. But subsequent investigation ran aground.
The Parliamentary Committee that probed the "cash-for-votes" scam in 2008 had found no clinching evidence against Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh and Congress' Ahmed Patel.
The scam was probed after it rocked the Parliament on July 22, 2008 hours before the trust vote. Three MPs had flashed wads of notes in the Lok Sabha and complained to the Speaker that Amar Singh and Patel had attempted to bribe them for their support in the trust vote.
Sources said the committee headed by Kishore Chandra Deo believed the case needed to be investigated further by an independent agency and recommended a CBI probe into the scam.
The committee came to the conclusion based on the evidence presented before it. This included tapes provided by the private TV news channel which conducted a sting operation in collaboration with BJP MPs Ashok Argal, Fhagan Singh Kuleste and M Bhagor.
While after examining the tapes and other evidence the committee found no clinching evidence to indict Amar Singh or Ahmed Patel, its draft report contained veiled criticism of SP MP Reoti Raman Singh, who was shown in the tapes as indulging in "loose talk".
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