Oppn corners Jaya Jaitley over I-T raids

Hwever, Union Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha intervened to state that there was no resistance from Jaitly. “The I-T authorities recorded the statement of Jaitly and her daughter and they were fully cooperative,” he said, while replying to supplementaries during the question hour.

The Finance Minister assured the House that “there will be no trial outside the court. I would assure the House that we will maintain greatest circumspection to ensure that nobody is maligned. The Government has not come to any conclusion and nobody will be named before the matter is fully examined.”

I-T authorities had conducted the raid in a house following search warrants issued against cricketer Ajay Jadeja and had come across an address at Khirki extension here where both Jaitly and her daughter were present.

Meanwhile, Minister of State for Revenue Dhananjaya Kumar said out of 90 raids conducted recently by I-T authorities on cricketers, assets worth Rs 374.64 lakh were seized. “Inquiry is on and still we have to open 25 more lockers,” he said.

In reply to the main question, Kumar said searches were conducted at the premises of Mohammed Azharuddin, Ajay Jadeja, Kapil Dev, Nikhil Chopra, Manoj Prabhakar, Ajay Sharma and Navjoy Singh Sidhu. Searches were also conducted at the premises of two cricket administrators, Jagmohan Dalmiya and Kishore Rungta, he said.

To a question from Shiv Sena member Sanjay Nirupam on whether the Government would consider withdrawing players against whom allegations of match fixing have been levied till the time their name was cleared, Kumar said it was for the Sports Ministry to decide.