4 min readNew DelhiOct 28, 2023 01:00 PM IST
First published on: Oct 28, 2023 at 05:16 AM IST
Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra Friday admitted she gave her Parliament login and password details to her friend and businessman Darshan Hiranandani but denied taking any cash from him, as alleged by Supreme Court advocate Jai Anant Dehadrai in his complaint to the Central Bureau of Investigation.
In an interview to The Indian Express in the backdrop of the Lok Sabha Ethics Committee examining cash-for-query charges against her, Moitra said, “No MP types her/his own question. I have given him (Darshan) the password and login for someone in his office to type it (the questions) down and upload.”
To upload a question, an OTP (one-time password) is required, she said, “My phone number is given (for the OTP)… There is no question of Darshan or anyone putting it without my knowledge.”
Moitra on Friday sought time until after November 5, instead of October 31, to appear before the Ethics Committee. She claimed that her questions — nine of them — on the Adani Group were “extremely valid” and “in the national interest.”
To a question about allegations she took money and batted for Hiranandani against Adani, Moitra said, “Tell me where is the money? The main thing to prove is the quid pro quo. Darshan, in his affidavit, says he is the biggest fan of Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi. Where did he attack Adani? The analysis given in the affidavit (by Dehadrai) of my questions are laughable.”
She said Dehadrai’s complaint was fake. “You have used a person with a failed personal relationship to file a fake complaint and you have put a gun to a friend of mine’s (Darshan’s) head to back it up. But the two have to match.. It’s a bad hit job,” she said.
“We had an affidavit from Hiranandani but he did not mention any cash,” Moitra said.
On allegations she received expensive gifts, she said, “To the best of my knowledge, Darshan Hiranandani has given me one Hermes scarf on my birthday… I asked the Bobbi Brown makeup set, he had got me a Mac eye shadow and bitten peach lipstick.”
Moitra also said whenever she was in Mumbai or Dubai, Darshan’s car picked her up from the airport and dropped her. “I am telling you the exact truth and if Darshan can prove anything more than that. There is no cash or anything else I have ever taken from him. I thrive upon my integrity,” she said.
She alleged that the analysis of the questions she asked in the affidavit given by Dehadrai, on which BJP MP Nishikant Dubey wrote to the Lok Sabha Speaker seeking an inquiry against her, were “laughable and rubbish”.
She said she had made a mistake in choosing her personal relationship. “Yes. I have to plead guilty…I have terrible taste when it comes to choosing people in my personal circle. I hope to break it soon,” she said.
Dismissing that these allegations had isolated her in the party, Moitra said Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee has full faith in her “to be able to go and prove these frivolous allegations and stand up”.
“I am a loyal soldier of Trinamool and I will remain till I die. Short of being my birth mother, Mamata Banerjee is my mother. In this question, the charges are so ridiculous and unproven,” she said.
She said the ruling BJP chose to target her at a time when Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Trinamool Congress were cornering the government over unpaid MGNREGA dues to West Bengal.
“The party and Mamata Banerjee have been successful in showing how our state is being deprived… the BJP has chosen to run this slander campaign against me at this time,” she said.
Moitra also denied she got Hiranandani to renovate her house. “I had asked Darshan to make one of his architects give me a plan which he did and here it is (showing the drawing)… I have given this to the CPWD and the house work, from top to bottom, was done at my MP bungalow by the CPWD,” she said.
TMC MP Mahua Moitra at Parliament House complex, in New Delhi. (PTI File Photo) 
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