Lashing out at Union finance minister Arun Jaitley, noted lawyer and former law minister Ram Jethmalani said, ... Read More

MUMBAI: Lashing out at Union finance minister Arun Jaitley , noted lawyer and former law minister Ram Jethmalani said, "Arun Jaitley is the biggest disappointment."

"As the finance minister of India he has done nothing to fulfill the promise that the Modi government made to the people... to get back the Rs 90 lakh crore kept in banks abroad," Jethmalani told Times of India on Thursday. "Jaitley had made a promise that he would put Rs 15 lakh in the house of every poor man in India. What happened to the promise?"

Jethmalani also said there was "enough material in the allegations of financial irregularities" made by leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party against Jaitley in Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA) when the BJP leader was its president. Jaitley had told the media earlier that "facts would be extremely inconvenient" instead, for the opposition.

The finance minister has filed criminal and civil cases of defamation against Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal for "false and baseless" allegations he made. The Delhi high court has issued notice to Kejriwal and five other AAP leaders in the Rs 10 crore defamation suit and sought replies by February 5, 2016. Jethmalani said he is representing Kejriwal.

"In 2008 the German government had said it would be willing to share names 1400 clients of the Liechtenstein Bank to any requesting country. The names were given by a ex-bank employee. Not one politician went there. I went and the Germans told me that no request was made by the Indian government... Both, the previous government and this one, are at fault. Finally under orders of the Supreme Court, the government delivered to me the correspondence, in the form of 17 letters, but with the authors and addressee names blacked out with indelible ink," Jethmalani said.

"I went through the correspondence, it pertained to double taxation avoidance treaty (DDAT) meant for honest tax payers. The finance minister had said the scoring out of names, while handing over the correspondence, was in keeping with international practice," he said.