Alleges nothing moves without the Minister’s say-so.

Former IPL commissioner Lalit Modi launched a frontal attack on Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Sunday, saying nothing moved in the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) or the Indian Premier League (IPL) without the Minister’s say-so.

Mr. Modi is at the centre of a storm over the help he got from External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, though he is facing an Enforcement Directorate investigation into cases of foreign exchange violations while he ran the second season of the Indian Premier League in South Africa.

His comments came a day after Mr. Jaitley, who is on an official trip to Washington, said that a transaction of Rs. 11 crore between Mr. Modi and Ms. Raje’s son, Dushyant Singh, was a “commercial” one.

In a series of tweets in the evening, Mr. Modi alleged that Mr. Jaitley had control over the BCCI for decades and had continued to stick by his “oldest friend” — former Board president N. Srinivasan — even after the media and the court found him guilty.

He referred to an interview given to a television channel by former cricketer and BJP MP Kirti Azad in which he said that Mr. Jaitley, along with other powerful BCCI members like NCP chief Sharad Pawar, Congress leader Rajiv Shukla and Mr. Srinivasan, should share responsibility for the foreign exchange violations during IPL Season 2.

(With inputs from PTI)

Govt. draws up three-pronged strategy

By Smita Gupta

The Union government is mulling over a damage-control plan to try and change the current Lalit Modi controversy-driven narrative before the commencement of the monsoon session of Parliament in July. The strategy, party insiders say, has three elements that the ruling dispensation hopes will wipe the slate clean, close the fault lines within the BJP and effectively stem the Opposition onslaught against it. >Read more

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