Jaitley using position to avenge defeat: Amarinder

With his son Raninder Singh being summoned by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), Punjab Congress president Amarinder Singh on Sunday accused Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitely of misusing departments under his ministry to settle political scores.

"Jaitley still appears to be licking his wounds over his defeat from Amritsar and that is the reason he is using the departments like Income Tax and Enforcement Directorate to issue summons to my family members," Amarinder said in a statement here.

"But let me tell you, political battles are better fought in political battlegrounds and not by using deceit and subterfuge to avenge a political defeat," he told Jaitley.

Amarinder had defeated Jaitley, who was contesting a popular election for the first time, in the 2014 general election on the Amritsar Lok Sabha seat. Jaitley lost by a big margin of over one lakh votes.

"Every time he recalls his defeat, he orders one of his agencies like the Income Tax department or the Enforcement Directorate to issue a summons against one or the other of my family members," Amarinder, former chief minister (2002-2007) of Punjab, said while reacting to the ED summons issued against Raninder Singh.

"Not that it matters to us as we will come clean no matter to what extent they go, but it actually reveals a petty mindset of a petty man who can stoop too low to resort to such petty things," he said, accusing Jaitely of getting the summons issued.

Noting that the income tax department had recently filed a complaint against his son in a Ludhiana court, he claimed that they "are deliberately doing it at regular intervals to defame us ahead of (Punjab assembly) elections".

--IANS

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