The >stubborn silence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and of national leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party over the involvement of Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje in the >unfolding Lalit Modi saga is a revelation in itself. That the >actions of Ms. Raje in support of Lalit Modi and the murky business dealings of her son Dushyant Singh are beyond what is politically defensible, is obvious. What is equally clear is that inner-party rivalries are at work and that party president Amit Shah and Prime Minister Modi appear to be watching Ms. Raje’s descent from public grace more as spectators than as custodians of political ethics. For persons holding high office, silence becomes ominous when it has the effect of whittling down the personal and moral authority of the ruling party. The allegations concerning the Rajasthan Chief Minister are indeed serious. The longer the Modi-Shah team takes to respond to the charges against one of their own Chief Ministers, the stronger would be the suspicion that they have something to hide. If Ms. Raje’s actions cannot be condoned, the Prime Minister and Mr. Shah must say so, and the BJP must take steps to have her removed as Chief Minister. If they have explanations in >defence of the business deals and political links of Ms. Raje’s son with Lalit Modi , they must place them in the public domain. To not take either of these courses but maintain a mystifying silence, will be to make a mockery of the offices they hold. If the misconduct of Ms. Raje was of a higher order than the impropriety committed by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, whom the BJP has supported emphatically over the past few days, the >Prime Minister must say so , and not wait for the controversy to come to a head. Silence and patience might have worked if this was a storm that would have blown over, and not a snowballing crisis.
Ms. Raje’s role has come to light only because the former Indian Premier League commissioner decided to flaunt his political connections in India in a bid to portray himself as a victim of vendetta under the erstwhile United Progressive Alliance regime. It is now up to the Modi government to demonstrate that it will not fall for this ploy as far as the investigations against Lalit Modi relating to alleged violations of tax and foreign exchange laws are concerned. It cannot afford to give the impression that it is not keen to pursue the probes to their logical conclusion. A >much-belated appeal is likely to be filed soon in the Supreme Court against a Delhi High Court verdict quashing the revocation of his passport. Regardless of the outcome of the appeal, what is important is that no unwarranted legal concessions are made in favour of a person evading an investigation with an unfounded claim that his life is under threat in India.
