The draft report of the V Kishore Chandra Deo Committee has discounted both — a video clip and the bag displayed in the Lok Sabha — as sufficient material for proving the complicity of SP general secretary Amar Singh in the cash-for-vote scam, sources said on Monday. The committee is scheduled to meet next on October 17 to finalise the report before it is presented to the Lok Sabha. The seven-member House panel can amend the contents of the draft report or incorporate any dissenting note before its submission.Though the draft report concludes that there is no case against Congress leader Ahmed Patel and there is an absence of any clinching evidence against Amar Singh, it has recommended that for the future, the procedure requiring the appearance of a member of one House before a committee of the other House be amended. Both Patel and Amar Singh are members of the Rajya Sabha. This change was suggested by the Privileges Committee way back in 1958. According to existing rules, a committee of one House of Parliament cannot summon a member of the other House.“The material on record,” according to the draft report, “does not conclusively prove that the money contained in the bag, which was eventually displayed in the House, was actually sent by Shri Amar Singh for winning over” BJP MPs Ashok Argal, Faggan Singh Kulaste and Mahavir Bhagora to vote in favour of the motion of confidence.The video clip of a car entering and coming out of Amar Singh house, the report says, does not show faces of people (claimed to be Argal and Kulaste) sitting on the rear seat. It does not say whether they went on their own or were invited. Nor does it prove what transpired inside the house. “There is nothing to show that money was offered for voting in favour of motion of confidence or for abstaining from voting.”The report is critical of the conduct of SP member Reoti Raman Singh vis-a-vis his “endeavours to facilitate defection of the members to Samajwadi Party in violation of the provisions of the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution”. “Taking the statement made by Shri Singh before the committee at face value that the talk of money was in context of Shri Argal joining the Samajwadi Party the committee still feels that a person of Shri Reoti Ram Singh’s eminence and standing should not have involved himself in such shenanigans.”Sanjeev Saxena, the draft report concludes, “was a bribe giver wittingly or unwittingly”. “He, therefore, does not enjoy any immunity under Article 105(2) of the Constitution. Evidently, he did not know that the members were whistleblowers. Hence he could very well be giving bribe with a view to influencing the members in their parliamentary conduct.” The panel has listed several questions: On whose behest was he operating? Was it on behalf of Amar Singh, as alleged? Why did he go to BJP office on Ashoka Road? From where was the bag of money loaded into his car? Was Saxena hijacked and coerced into completing an operation that had been aborted for a consideration? Therefore, the panel felt, his role needed further investigation.Referring to Suhail Hindustani, the report suggested a probe by investigating agencies on the ground that he does not appear to be above board considering his own manoeuvering in the operation.The report found the justification put forth by Sudheendra Kulkarni for conceptualising the sting operation “unconvincing”. While making it clear that he does not enjoy any immunity under Article 105(2) of the Constitution, the panel felt the matter needs an inquiry by an investigating agency.
