Cong divided over funds diversion charge against Joshi

On her part,Joshi has denied the charges and said an audit of the election expenditure was in process and “mere reconciliation” had to be done.

The allegations have made the UPCC a divided house,with one section supporting the treasurer and another,the president.

According to Subodh Srivastava,chief spokesperson of the UPCC,Gupta was removed on September 23 because of financial irregularities.

Denying the charge,Gupta said: “I have been framed by the UPCC president because I had exposed her in front of a senior AICC official.” She has misused AICC funds meant for elections and also diverted Rs 70 lakh out of Rs 1 crore meant for statewide activities to Lucknow. “I had recovered this amount from her. Moreover,she has also been asking me to get funds for construction of an engineering college of her son,” he said.

Joshi,who had contested the Lok Sabha election from Lucknow,said Gupta was making baseless allegations after he was removed.

She said she had removed him after obtaining approval from the AICC. Also,the audit had been ordered by the AICC on her request.

Gupta said he was under treatment in Delhi’s Ganga Ram Hospital since April 25 for spinal problems. Talking on phone from Delhi,he said he was not a politician,but “an exporter of gold jewellery who was given an opportunity during the presidentship of Salman Khushid”.

“I was made the chairman of the Marketing Cell and I spent Rs 3 to 4 lakh to build the first floor office of the Congress headquarters in Lucknow,” he said. “Thus,there is no question of me committing any irregularity,I have got enough by the grace of God.”

Gupta said AICC general secretary Digvijay Singh had called him for a discussion about the issue sometime ago and “I informed Digvijayji about everything.”

Joshi contended that the issue had been unnecessarily hyped. “These are internal matters and people have been misled and misinformed,” she said. “But I would not say that the ex-treasurer has indulged in financial bungling. It is just that he has been a bit lax in his accounting and has been unwell too,so we decided to remove him.”

As the issue has came into the open,some district presidents said they were either given less than the allotted funds or no fund at all.

“We never raised our voice because we are too small to complain about the big people,” said one of the district presidents. “But when some of the hotels and travel agencies reported that their dues had not been cleared,everyone started asking where the funds actually went.” Congress sources said a high-level internal inquiry is in progress.