india

Updated: May 12, 2016 12:29 IST

In another salvo against the Bharatiya Janata Party and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Uttarakhand Congress on Wednesday alleged that the rivals spent Rs 700 crore to stage the unsuccessful “political coup” against the Harish Rawat government.

“We have confirmed reports that the BJP and its managers deployed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi who took the state politics to hostage for nearly 55 days spent Rs 700 crore to usher in an era of instability in Uttarakhand,” alleged PCC president Kishor Upadhyay. He was speaking to the reporters after the news reached here from Delhi that centre was going to lift the President’s rule soon.

Upadhyay alleged the BJP leaders were trying to allure Congress legislators till the last moments of the trust vote. However, the saffron party could influence only one MLA in Rekha Arya, he added.

As this was not enough, Upadhyay further alleged, the BJP leader deployed here to manage the show tried to allure three Congress MLAs offering them chief ministerial post, but Congress legislators turned down the offers. He added, “Modi was in such a great haste to impose the President’s rule in the state that he left the election engagement in Assam to chair the cabinet meeting in Delhi.”

Upadhyay said, “Now that Congress is set to revive its government, we (the party leaders) will request the chief minister to constitute a two-member judicial inquiry commission to investigate into the matter and bring the truth to the fore.”

BJP, however, denied the charges and said the Congress allegations were “baseless and frivolous”. “Harish Rawat may have got an opportunity to revive his government on the basis of numbers in the House, but Congress cannot deny the fact on-camera evidences against its leaders and himself. Sting CDs are there for everyone to see. Congress party cannot blame us for its own follies at a time when it’s neck-deep involved in the corruption cases and records are in camera,” alleged Munna Singh Chauhan, spokesperson for the state BJP.