In the eye of the raging IPL storm, Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar on Saturday rubbished the charge that his party or ministerial colleague Praful Patel was involved in any alleged wrongdoing relating to the the T20 league.
"NCP or Civil Aviation Minsiter Praful Patel has nothing to do with the Indian Premier League controversy," Pawar said addressing a party convention in Ratnagiri (Maharashtra), tonight.
"We are clean and have nothing to do with it. We welcome the inquiry instituted by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee in the IPL episode," he said.
Pawar said no inquiry was conducted against Praful Patel in this regard though Income Tax authorities had collected some papers from his office.
"The authorities never questioned Patel in this connection. Only some papers were collected from his office in New Delhi," Pawar said, adding "we are unnecessarily being dragged into the controversy."
An email was sent from the office of Patel by his daughter Poorna, IPL's hospitality manager, to former Union Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor regarding projections of evaluation of IPL franchises a couple of days before the auction of two new franchises--Pune and Kochi. The information, Patel had claimed, was already in public domain. PTI
