‘Sue us, if find fault with report on Black Money’- Challenges S Gurumurthy

Black Money Probe stand by findings

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Advani’s noble personal regret is being turned into a political apology, according to task force convenor

S Gurumurthy, convener of the task force that named the Gandhi family in its report on black money in foreign banks, stood by its findings despite BJP veteran L K Advani’s apology to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi. Speaking on behalf of the four-member team that prepared the report, he said Advani’s apology was not about the report per se. It had “more to do with the hurt” Sonia had expressed in her letter to Advani.
“A noble personal regret is being turned into a political apology” by the Congress, Gurumurthy told The New Indian Express.

Speaking about the report in the light of the current controversy surrounding it, he clarified: “This is not a BJP report. It’s a report prepared by domain experts.

All its members are experts in their respective fields. Even the BJP is not excluded from its implications.”

Gurumurthy explained that the report -prepared by for mer IB chief Ajit Doval, IIM-Banglore professor R Vaidyanathan, eminent lawyer Mahesh Jethmalani and Gurumurthy himself – has made wideranging recommendations.

“It has stated all political parties lack credibility and should come forward with declarations that they own no assets abroad.”

The contents of the report are “drawn from facts in the public domain”, mostly media reports.

In a veiled swipe at the BJP, he said the report’s contents are the responsibility of the task force, and not the BJP, Advani or the NDA.

Gurumurthy’s clarification assumes importance because the task force report was seen to have been commissioned by the BJP, and Advani’s apology seemed to undercut it. THROWING DOWN THE GAUNTLET “The task force members have consulted each other and stand by every word of the report. Anyone who wants to fault the report is invited to sue us. We challenge them to do so,” Gurumurthy stated.

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