Entries by Yeddyurappa reveal payment of ₹1,800 Crore to ‘chowkidars’

A diary recovered by the Income Tax Department in 2017 reveals a payment of ₹1,800 Crore by former Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa to BJP leaders, reported Caravan magazine on Friday.

• The entries are said to be in Yeddyurappa’s own handwriting
• The entries were allegedly made in 2009
• The entries were made in a state legislator’s diary
• The entries are in Kannada
• BJP’s central committee was paid ₹1000 Crore
• Current Finance Ministers Arun Jaitley and Nitin Gadkari were paid ₹150 Crore each

• Rajnath Singh, the present Home Minister, was allegedly paid ₹100 Crore
• LK Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi received ₹50 Crore each, suggest entries

Even more sensationally, the entries claimed that Yeddyurappa paid ₹250 Crore to ‘judges’ and ₹50 Crore to lawyers. But no names were mentioned.

The entries also claim that ₹10 Crore were spent on Nitin Gadkari’s son’s wedding.

Caravan magazine claimed that the documents accessed by it bear the BJP leader and former chief minister’s signature on every page. Several entries were dated January, 2009.

Hours after the magazine posted the report on its website, the site disappeared from the Net and the report appeared to have been taken down.

B S Yeddyurappa has served as chief minister of Karnataka twice, the third time in 2018 was the shortest. He was chief minister twice between November, 2007 and July, 2012.

This is the second time Income Tax Department has found documents that recorded pay offs to BJP leaders. In what is known as Birla and Sahara papers, Excel sheets and depositions by Birla and Sahara executives indicated pay offs in Crores to political leaders of various parties, the largest from the BJP including Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

While CBI had found ₹25 Crore in cash from the Delhi office of a Birla company, the Income Tax Department had seized documents during a raid in an office-cum-guesthouse of the Sahara Group in Greater Kailash locality of the national capital.

Both the cases were buried by the Department. And petitions demanding an inquiry were dismissed by the Supreme Court, which ruled that mere mention of names in diaries or documents were not enough to defame the people concerned. This has been the stand of the court since Jain Hawala case.

Meanwhile, Congress spokesman Randeep Surjewala on Friday demanded an independent inquiry into the disclosure.

Addressing a press conference on Friday, Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said, "If there is no truth to this diary then why did the BJP not get an inquiry done on this. If this true then is this not a first-hand report of BJP's corruption? Why is there no independent inquiry of this? Now there is also Lok Pal and other independent bodies in place. Chor chowkidar is answerable for this."

"From this diary, five facts come out. Close to ₹2690 crore was sought and ₹1800 crore was given to BJP. Yeddyurappa was the CM during the period. There are his signatures on each page. This was given to BJP's central team. It mentions names of senior BJP leaders from Rajnath Singh to Jaitley. There is an allegation of bribe of ₹1800 crore on the top BJP leadership,” said Surjewala

“Is it true or false? The diary with BS Yeddyurappa's sign on it, was with the Income Tax Department since 2017. If that is the case why did Modi ji and BJP did not get it investigated? These are the people who are responsible for the biggest ministries. These are the leaders who are literally running the country,” he said

“Chowkidar and company was caught red-handed, Congress cites ‘Yeddy diaries’ claiming that BS Yeddyurappa made payouts to senior BJP leaders during his tenure as Karnataka CM. The committee has big names such as Modi and others. Judges and lawyers have been given ₹250 crore to ₹50 crore. The diary have been with the income tax dept since Aug 2017 according to the report by The Caravan."