Noor Mohammad, in his article “By Blaming UPA’s 80:20 Gold Import Scheme, BJP is Trying to Deflect Attention from PNB Fraud”, published March 11, 2018, in The Wire writes:

“Fearing a political backlash over the mega fraud perpetrated by Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi in the Punjab National Bank (PNB), the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) is trying to divert public attention by blaming it on the Congress-led UPA government’s 80:20 gold import scheme.”

On the one hand, Mr Mohammad — who had incidentally written two blatantly factually incorrect articles on khadi and rural electrification – claims that the party in office at the Centre, and by implication the current administration, is deflecting attention from the alleged PNB fraud case by citing the last administration’s 80:20 gold import scheme. On the other, he defends the 80:20 gold import scheme which was evidently controversial and suspects in both its intent as well as timing.

Not surprisingly, the writer’s claims become even more suspect when we take a closer look at the evidence available in the public domain regarding the gold import scheme.

(Incidentally, Mr Mohammad’s two previous articles mentioned above were refuted by The True Picture in “Who is Spinning Tales on Khadi Sales?” and “‘The Wire’ Writer Who Got Khadi Story Wrong Now Spins a Yarn About Rural Electrification” respectively.)

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Let us now look in detail at the evidence on the 80:20 gold import scheme.