Chidambaram's columns did not exactly set Yamuna on fire: Piyush Goyal

NEW DELHI: A combative government rejected the opposition's vendetta charge in the wake of raids on the premises of former finance minister P Chidambaram's son and those linked to the controversial property deals of RJD boss Lalu Prasad's relatives. Finance minister Arun Jaitley asserted that the CBI and the income tax department had acted on the basis of "substantial basis and reasonable suspicion".

On the day BJP was voted to power three years ago, Jaitley also warned that more such moves were in the offing. “Now, people in high positions acquiring assets through shell companies is not a small matter and I think the day of reckoning has come for many , they will all be held accountable,“ the finance minister said, with sources interpreting his remarks as a sign that the government could be planning to implement the Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Act.

Jaitley was replying to questions about the opposition's allegation that the actions of the I-T department and the CBI marked the government's vindictiveness to wards opposition leaders.

Power minister Piyush Goyal was equally bellicose in rejecting the opposition's charge, and mocked Chidambaram for alleging that the raids on his premises in connection with the probe against his son Karti were an attempt to stop him from speaking and writing against the government. "His columns did not exactly set the Yamuna on fire,“ he said.

"He (Chidambaram) will be his son's stroke," Goyal said in a reference to the charge that during his father's tenure in the finance min istry, Karti helped orga nise Foreign Invest ment Promotion Board clearances.

Highlighted the raids as a proof of the Modi government's Goyal resolve to fight corruption. “During its three years in power, the BJP has given an honest, scam-free govern ment, a decisive leader and pro-poor thrust on govern ance and has helped the country become the fastest growing large economy for the first time ever,“ he said.

Goyal said the BJP government did not interfere with investigation agencies.